Police Officers on Monday accosted and arrested some members of the BringBackOurGirls campaign group during a protest at the presidential villa in Abuja on Monday.
Members of the group were protesting against what they call high-level of insecurity in the country and they insisted that they have the right to stage a peaceful protest without hindrance.
While the protesters were barricaded by policemen, the Convener of the group, Oby Ezekwesili granted an interview with Channels Television, where she said the Nigerian Police by accosting the protesters infringed on their fundamental rights to free movement.She said the police officers obstructed them from proceeding to the Unity Fountain and formed a barricade around the protesters.
The Bring Back Our Girls (BBOG) is a pressure group that championed the campaign on the return of the more than 270 Chibok Schoolgirls abducted from their hostel in 2014 in Borno state.
On her tweet handle on Tuesday, the former Minister of Education and self-appointed political referee, who recently flashed a red card on television to the administration of President Muhammadu Buhari, wrote: “President @MBuhari at your instruction, the IG of @PoliceNG continues to detain me and have arrested some of our members
“President @Mbuhari , the police officers deployed by IG of @PoliceNG is violating my freedom of movement by locking me in broad day light at the Unity Fountain.
“This is a democracy. Officer Tina Ishaya just again refused to let me out of their wall.
“The FG of President @MBuhari instructed the IG of @PoliceNG to detain me and other members of @bbog_nigeria here at the Unity Fountain.
“Police men and women have built an impregnable wall and locked me in. I have asked them more than 30 times to let me out and they refused.”
But latest reports say she has been released.
Curiously, another group of the BBOG protesters was able to proceed to the Presidential Villa. The group took off from the Eagle Square, less than a kilometre from the Unity Fountain, where Ezekwesili and others were detained.
