..Youths dare police, mark anniversary in Lagos, Abuja
By Emma Ogbuehi
Investment banker and erstwhile managing director of IBTC bank, Atedo Peterside has lamented that one year after the #ENDSARS protests that rocked the southern parts of the country and Abuja, not much has changed on the part of the police.
Peterside made the remarks at an Arise Television Morning Show programme monitored by our correspondent. According to him, “what is rather changing is more educated people becoming politically active”. He added that the new wave of awareness, among the educated people, especially devoid of violence, is what is needed to form a movement that would take the country out of its current political and economic uncertainties.
Atedo’s remarks came on the heels of the youths trooping out in their numbers to mark the one year anniversary of the #ENDSARS protests in Lagos and the Federal Capital Territory, despite stringent warning by the police and heavy security presence in strategic points. While the demonstrators staged their protests on Abuja streets, they rode in buses in Lagos, waving Nigerian flags.
In October last year, Nigerian youths took to the streets in major state capitals, demanding an end to the brutality of the Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) of the police especially in areas of trampling on the fundamental human rights of the citizens, particularly the young people. They listed five-point demands to be met by the federal government, including police reform, as conditions for halting the protests. The demonstration were almost assuming the pattern of a revolution when it was hijacked by hoodlums to unleash mayhem on other Nigerians.
In Lekki Tollgate, the epicentre of the protests, unspecified number of youths were allegedly killed or injured when the soldiers opened fire on the protesters.
