ALMAJIRIS: Expelling Non-indegenes Threatens National Unity, Senior Lawyers Warn
With the sustained evacuation of non-indigenes from different states of the federation as part of measures to enforce the COVID-19 guidelines and regulations, senior lawyers saturday warned that such decisions might stoke constitutional crisis and further endanger the unity of the country.
Besides, the lawyers argued that the decisions of the state governments to send non-indigenes to their states of origin violated Chapter III and section 41 of the 1999 Constitution, which respectively spell out the privileges of every Nigerian citizen and guarantee fundamental human rights.
In separate conversations with Thisday, a former VH of the West African Bar Association (WABA), Mr. Femi Falana (SAN); Nigeria’s leading human rights lawyer, Mr. Ebun Adegboruwa (SAN) and a former Chairman, Governing Council, National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), Dr. Chidi Odinkalu expressed grave concern about the decisions of these governors.
Hiding under these enforcement of the COVID-19 guidelines and regulations, the Kano State Government had evacuated non-indigenes, especially Almajiris residing within its territories to their states of origin across the North.
The decision of the Kano State Government had sparked reprisal in other states across the federation with Kaduna, Kwara, Lagos, Nasarawa and Osun, among others, either expelling non-indigenes from their states of residence to their states of origin or denying them entry into their territories under the guide of enforcing the COVID-19 guidelines and regulations.
With these developments, Falana observed that the fundamental rights to freedom of movement, like other rights under the 1999 Constitution, might be derogated from or abridged in defence of public health, public safety or public morality.
The human rights lawyer acknowledged that in order to reduce the spread of the coronavirus, the federal government banned inter state locomotion of all citizens for two weeks.
He noted that the decision “cannot be questioned since it is based on the protection of public health. Section 45 of the 1999 Constitution allows such derogations,” which according to him, are based strictly on public interest.
However, Falana observed the policy might be impugned if it is applied in a discriminatory or selective manner, noting that even though the Nigeria Governors Forum (NGF) suggested the policy, the federal government accepted it.
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