Group to protest continued closure of Peace Corps’ office on Friday

By John Oba

Abuja

A Coalition of Civil Society Organisations under the aegis of Justice and Equity (COALITION – JE), has warned the Inspector General of Police (IGP) Idris Abubakar, to vacate the national headquarters of Peaces Corps of Nigeria before Friday or face a nationwide protest.
Justice Gabriel Kolawole, of the Federal High Court sitting in Abuja had in a recent judgement ordered by the IGP to vacate the office of the paramilitary organization.
Addressing the press, the Convener, Comrade Olayemi Success, said it will go ahead with the protest in the hope that the police would stop perpetrating illegality against the Corps.
According to them, the IGP should be sacked to prevent him from further ridiculing the executive and Nigerians at large.
“Granted that IGP Idris and other parties to the suit have the right to appeal against some or all of the judgment, as they have recently done, it is settled that an appeal does not in any way operate as a stay of execution of valid judgment, even at that, a motion for stay of execution must have been filed and granted warrant noncompliance with judgment of the court.
“As at the last time we checked, there is no order for stay of execution filed, it therefore goes without saying that IGP Idris and his men have no legal basis to remain in occupation of a property which they ought to have unsealed over a month ago.
“We can boldly say that the action of the IGP is the reason behind the recent complaint by the Chief Justice of Nigeria that the executive arm of government has constituted itself into a clog in the wheel of Justice by refusing to obey court judgments. This is rather unfortunate and worrisome.
“Therefore, we want to notify the general public that come Friday, December 22, 2017, we shall mobilise other CSOs, women, youth and students for a mass protest to the National Assembly with a view to demand for him removal from office,” he said.
The group also called on the courts to discontinue any legal proceeding from the Police saying they have consistently refused to obey court judgments and they do not deserve to be heard.
The group also called for the disbandment of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) of the Nigerian police force, describing as unfortunate the situation were the IGP instead of listening to genuine agitations of Nigerians sponsored a hired crowd to protest in support of SARS which was aired on national television.

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