Flaunt Weeekly
A spokesperson for the Nigerian police urged PREMIUM TIMES he would discover why the outdated skool militant leader used to be yet to be arrested like others who committed a similar offences.
Many Nigerians who mediate in a notorious perfect precept, “equality earlier than the regulation,” must win conception that the nation’s authorities would at as soon as arrest Asari Dokubo, a outdated skool Niger Delta Militant, for brandishing rifles in a video clip.
However they win been inappropriate!
Extra than eight months after the clip surfaced online, Mr Dokubo used to be yet to be arrested or summoned for questioning.
As a substitute, the outdated skool militant leader has been hobnobbing with the nation’s authorities despite brandishing the rifles in decided violation of Nigerian regulation.
The video clip started trending on 18 June, about four days after he met with President Bola Tinubu on the Presidential Villa, Abuja, whom he supported all the way in which via the 25 February presidential election.
However an self ample investigation by PREMIUM TIMES came across that Mr Dokubo launched the clip in slack September 2022, but it undoubtedly first went viral days later in October, about eight months within the past.
The clip appeared on a YouTube page on 1 October 2022.
The viral clip
In the video clipMr Dokubo used to be heard calling the Igbos “slaves”, whom he said he would win persisted to “promote” if no longer for the intervention of the British authorities.
The outdated skool militant leader, who spoke on assorted factors, brandished two AK-47 rifles whereas threatening to execute all Igbos, an ethnic group predominant in Nigeria’s South-east.
Mr Dokubo is a Kalabari, a allotment of the Ijaw ethnic nationality in Rivers Exclaim, Nigeria’s South-south.
The outdated skool militant leader equally mocked the Igbos, announcing they win been “demise” in colossal numbers.
“You would possibly presumably well build a video to promote that Alhaji has trudge away? Are you seeing me? I build no longer trudge,” Mr Dokubo said, it sounds as if referring to himself, as he brandished the AK-47 rifle.
“Una head no correct,” he spoke in Pidgin English, whereas selecting and brandishing another AK-47 rifle.
“E be like insist una dey survey for who hasten conclude una? Gaze for una in all places (and) conclude una. Una dey request me?” he said in Pidgin English, threatening Igbos.
When translated into English, the expression formulation, “Is reminiscent of you contributors (Igbos) are taking a study for who will execute you all? Any individual who will hunt for you in all places and execute all of you.”
Is Dokubo above the regulation?
No particular person shall win in his possession or below his aid watch over any firearm or ammunition with the exception of with a license from the president or the inspector-frequent of police, based entirely on Nigeria’s Firearms Act No 32 of the 1959 CAP F28 LFN 2004.
Offenders face no longer lower than ten years imprisonment on conviction.
Numerous contributors win been arrested and prosecuted for illegally possessing firearms or making ethnic slurs on social media.
The police in Abuja, for occasion, arrested a pastor of the Home on the Rock Refuge Church, Uche Aigbe, in February after a video clip of him carrying an AK-47 rifle all the way in which via a Sunday church carrier went viral on social media.
The police would later fee the pastor at a magistrate court docket in Abuja with conspiracy to commit execute, unlawful possession of prohibited firearms, inciting disturbance and prison intimidation.
Mr Aigbe, via his attorney, said he purchased the firearm from a police officer posted to the church and had simplest aged the firearm for an illustration whereas preaching a sermon about religion within the church.
The police said the offence used to be punishable below Part 111 of the Firearms Act CAP F28, LFN 2004 and contravened Sections 97, 114 and 397 of the Penal Code.
The case used to be serene ongoing as of the time of this document.
Moreover, the police in Osun Exclaimon 16 June, arrested a social media one who made anti-Igbo tweet.
“Let’s execute the entire Igbos. Let’s flush them out of Yoruba lands. I abhor these contributors with ardour. They are violent contributors. They are the worst. They abhor us. Let’s abhor them with out conserving encourage,” the police quoted the suspect as posting on his Twitter address on 18 Can also.
The police said the Twitter publish violated social media coverage on abhor speech.
Mr Dokubo, within the viral clip, violated each the social media coverage on abhor speech and the firearm act as properly as the penal code. However he used to be yet to be arrested or summoned by the Nigerian Police.
When contacted, the potential spokesperson, Olumuyiwa Adejobi, urged PREMIUM TIMES that he would discover why the outdated skool militant leader used to be yet to be arrested or prosecuted like others who committed a similar offences.
Mr Adejobi, a prime superintendent of police, promised to revert to this newspaper with answers.
However he used to be yet to construct so several days after.
Lawyers react
Stanley Alieke, an Abuja-based entirely perfect practitioner, urged PREMIUM TIMES that Mr Dokubo, as a civilian and non-security agent, used to be no longer licensed by the regulation to possess a “combatant weapon” reminiscent of an AK-47 rifle.
“Possession of firearms is in itself a crime,” Mr Alieke said, including that even a combatant used to be no longer allowed to win a firearm out of doorways his accountability publish with out permission from his superiors.
The attorney, nonetheless, said the precept of equality earlier than the regulation has been a cliché aged in courts of regulation but is no longer practicable, notably in Nigeria.
He said, like Mr Dokubo, assorted contributors that win issued threats and made ethnic slurs within the nation within the previous win been yet to be prosecuted.
“It be wretched,” he said of non-prosecution of offenders.
“Totally licensed gun holders can lift guns. And there is the form of gun it is doubtless you’ll presumably well also moreover be given a licence for. It be for making an try functions,” said Monday Ubani, an Abuja-based entirely attorney and chairman of the Part on Public Curiosity and Style Law convention of the Nigerian Bar Affiliation (NBA).
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“It be simplest the safety companies that can lift AK-47 rifles,” he said.
Mr Ubani said the reality that the police had no longer arrested Mr Dokubo means that the precept of equality earlier than the regulation used to be no longer practicable in Nigeria.
“It be clearly unlawful,” the attorney said of Mr Dokubo’s brandishing of rifles and threatening of the Igbos.
“If it is lawful that a Nigerian citizen brandished a gun, threatening a total trudge, I mediate the safety companies desires to be up and doing in effecting an arrest of that individual and bringing him to justice.”
He regretted that there would possibly be “disagreeable lawlessness” in Nigeria and that some contributors win been no longer prosecuted as soon as they violated the regulation as a consequence of their role in bringing the leaders to vitality.
For Bulus Atsen, another perfect practitioner, the arrest of Mr Dokubo by Nigerian authorities used to be no longer going despite “clearly violating” the regulation.
“I said so because here in Nigeria, even even supposing the frequent precept is that no-one is above the regulation, times and times again, we win considered the save the application of the regulation is accomplished in a technique that favours some contributors over others,” Mr Atsen, a outdated skool chairperson of the NBA in Abuja, said.
The attorney said the authorities would possibly presumably well also unbiased win neglected Mr Dokubo as a consequence of that it is doubtless you’ll presumably well also mediate of “financial implications” his arrest would space off.
He cited Mr Dokubo’s role in ending militancy within the Niger Delta space and involvement in holding coarse oil pipelines within the space.
