The Country Director of Amnesty International, Isa Sanusi, has tagged Nigeria’s human rights record as bad, gloomy and unfortunate especially under the current government.
Sanusi who spoke to News Central on Tuesday decried the government’s weaponization of the Cybercrime Act to hunt journalists and human rights activists.
“The state of human rights in Nigeria is bad, is gloomy, and unfortunate. We have been going down the hill from bad to worse because things are not improving.
“All efforts done by the civil society and activists to make sure that Nigeria is reasonably human rights compliant is not working because we are witnessing increasing threats to freedom of expression, to the weaponization of the Cyber Crimes Act, and weaponization of defamation accusations, and the attempts to guard journalists and the media,” he said.
Sanusi also criticised the government on the economic hardship and continuous rising inflation which he said has not improved despite the 561 days of the current administration.
He also claimed that Nigerians cannot exercise their rights to protest against the current hardship because the government has no regard for human rights.
“The conflict in the northern part of the country in 561 days we are still where we are. The problems have continued. The removal of the pure subsidy I have to mention and I had very dreadfully said that our inflation level is now 34.7 percent.
“There was a country where the inflation level was seven percent and they are protesting everyday. Our own is 34 point something, therefore human rights is not improving. Things are not getting better and we try every year when a new government comes in to present a human rights agenda for them,” he stated.
Sanusi continued, “We are not saying that they have to do what we are doing but we are giving them encouragement, the guidance to do the right thing.
“Unfortunately, they always look the other way. It is only when they leave power then they start talking about human rights, which is very very important.”
