Several citizens in the Abuja municipality have confessed to taking bribes from government officials to shun the protest against bad governance and rising cost of living.
Government officials were alleged to have handed N5,000 each to citizens to dissuade them from taking part in the protests that entered day two Friday. The Abuja municipal chairman Chris Maikalangu was accused of distributing the paltry sum a cluster of citizens as they prepared to take to the streets in the nation’s capital on Friday afternoon, witnesses said.
He also reportedly threatened violence against those who insisted on exercising their rights to peaceful assembly.
“I am (among) the persons that they gave N5,000,” a witness told reporters on Friday.
“They lectured us that we shouldn’t go to protest.” It is illegal to offer bribes to deter citizens from exercising a constitutional right.
The development marks the latest attempt by federal authorities to stymie the nationwide demonstrations.
Mr. Maikalangu’s boss, Abuja minister Nyesom Wike, has been widely ridiculed for procuring a series of dubious mandates from different judges to foreclose the popular marches, which millions are now using to muster a common front against President Bola Tinubu’s draconian economic policies. Abuja is among the key hotspots of the protests, which commenced on Thursday in Lagos, Kano and other cities.
UNIBEN Students protesting