The Minister of data and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, says the #EndSARS protest is one among the foremost successful demonstrations Nigeria has ever witnessed, press agency of Nigeria reports.
He, however, envisioned a far better Nigeria where the elemental human rights of individuals would be respected after the #EndSARS protests.
The minister, who spoke at a Special NAN Forum on Monday in Abuja, said the vision would, however, be achievable if the protesters would give peace an opportunity , end the protest and permit the govt to implement its unprecedented reform of the nation's security architecture.
Mohammed, who described #EndSARS as "one of the foremost popular and successful protests within the history of this country", regretted that the peaceful protest with genuine demands had been hijacked by hoodlums and other people with a selfish motive to destabilise the country.
He said the govt had started the method of unprecedented reform of the police and therefore the entire internal security structure following the #EndSARS protest.
"With every challenge, there's always a chance , and therefore the opportunity this protest has given us is to seem at a more holistic approach to reforming our internal security.
"For the primary time within the history of this country, a special police tactical unit is being formed which can be supervised not by a Police Command but a committee to be chaired by the governor of every state with representatives of youths and Civil Society Organisations.
"The committee chaired by the governor will have the responsibility to supervise the way the special security unit relates to the general public and perform its duties.
"The panel being put up will take complaints from the general public with regards to human rights abuses; this has never happened within the history of this country," he said.
Mohammed said following the #EndSARS protest, the govt unprecedentedly has directed the fixing of a judicial panel of enquiry in each state to research and prosecute erring security officers that had engaged in brutality and extrajudicial killings.
He said that it had been also the primary time that a government is fixing a Victim Support Fund to compensate victims of police brutality and extrajudicial killings within the 36 states and therefore the Federal Capital Territory.
READ ALSO:
"In line with the new Police Act, officers to be enlisted within the new tactical police unit are going to be tested psychologically and mentally to make certain that they're fit the operations.
"This will put an enormous check on police abuse and extrajudicial killing which we've witnessed over the decades," he said.
Mohammed said that while the govt was within the process of implementing all the reforms, the #EndSARS group should end the protest which had already turned violent.
He reiterated that by allowing the govt to implement the reforms, the #EndSARS group would write their names in gold as champions of reformed internal security of Nigeria.
NaijaGistReporters
ConversionConversion EmoticonEmoticon