Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria, HURIWA, has condemned what it described as the arbitrary and illegal arrest and detention of the President of the Nigerian Labour Congress, NLC, Comrade Joe Ajaero by the Department of State Services, DSS.

The rights group also told President Bola Tinubu that trade unionism, human rights activism and journalism are not in anyway criminal but are rather integral stakeholders that sustain constitutional democracy.

The association said the government should play the game of governance by the rules, and put an end to acts of arbitrariness, illegal detentions and unconstitutional harassment of journalists, rights activists and trade union figures such as the President of Joe Ajaero by armed goons who are directly under the command and control of the President and the Commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces.

The group said that the President, elected under the 1999 Constitution must know that Nigeria is a constitutional democracy and his office is not the same as the tyranny that plays out in China which recently hosted the Nigerian and African Presidents.

“Rather under the Nigerian Constitution the people are the owners of the Sovereignty of Nigeria whereas the elected politicians are only exercising power legitimately through the donations of legitimacy made to them by the people of Nigeria through a democratic election for specified tenure,” HURIWA reminded the Presidency.

HURIWA further asked “the leaders of the respectable and powerful international community such as the President of the United States of America Mr. Joe Biden, the Prime Minister of Britain Mr. Keir Starmer, the PM of Canada Mr. Justin Trudeau and the Secretary General of the United Nations Mr. Antonio Guiterres to intervene in the rapidly deteriorating democratic standards in Nigetia under president Bola Ahmed Tinubu and to stop him from destroying democratic freedoms in his attempt to establish dictatorship and tyranny in Nigeria which violates the sanctity of the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria of 1999 as amended which the current administration swore to uphold”.

In a statement by the National Coordinator Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, HURIWA stated that the constant harassment and arrest of key human rights, media and trade union figures and particularly the constant tormenting through the instrumentality of the state armed security operatives is against the law.

The President of the Nigerian Labour Congress Comrade Joe Ajaero was arrested at the Abuja International Airport on Monday by the DSS.

HURIWA said Ajaero was arrested because he refused to be pocketed by the All Progressives Congress-led federal administration which has introduced toxic and deadly economic austerity measures that have unleashed mass hunger, poor salaries for the public workforce, mass unemployment, uncontrollable inflation amidst high rate of official corruption by government officials.

“We are by this statement calling for the immediate cessation of all kinds of coordinated attacks targeting the NLC, human rights campaigners and media practitioners by this administration so as to protect and preserve constitutional principles in Nigeria.”

Recall that the Nigeria Police Force had invited and interrogated Ajaero over allegations of terrorism financing, cybercrime, subversion, criminal conspiracy, and treasonable felony.

His invitation came in the wake of a night raid by the police on the NLC national secretariat in Abuja.

The police are alleging a link between the labour leader and a Briton, Andrew Wynne, who has been accused of financing the recent #EndBadGovernance or #Hunger protest in the country to allegedly overthrow the government of President Bola Tinubu.

Following Ajaero’s first appearance on August 29, the Police, in another letter signed by the Commissioner of Police, Operations, Ibitoye Alajide, on behalf of the Deputy Inspector General of Police, Force Intelligence Department, Abuja, asked him to appear again on Thursday, September 5, alongside the NLC General Secretary “to answer questions over alleged criminal intimidation, conducts likely to cause a breach of public peace, and malicious damage to property”.