ABUJA – Corporate Accountability and Public Participation Africa (CAPPA) has charged President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to raise the minimum wage for all categories of workers as well as to ensure that his administration works to protect and defend citizens’ democratic rights as Nigeria commemorates the 30th anniversary of the annulment of the June 12, 1993, presidential elections.
The group emphasised that the only way citizens’ long-standing aspirations and hope in true democracy, encapsulated in the drawn-out struggle against the de-annulment of June 12, can be met is when Nigerians can choose their leaders in a free, fair, and transparent process devoid of violence, ethnic hatred, and religious intolerance. The statement was signed by Zikora Ibeh, CAPPA’s Policy and Research Officer, and made available to journalists over the weekend.
According to the group, the President can show that he truly believes in democracy by indiscriminately providing all Nigerians, regardless of social class or racial, religious, or political affiliation, with the benefits of democracy.
According to the statement’s citation of Oluwafemi Akinbode, the executive director of CAPPA, “June 12 stands as a symbol of Nigerians’ steadfast struggle against military despotism and for democratic governance.” While past regimes have recognised and honoured the heroes of this remarkable struggle, we believe that the need for Nigerians to fully exercise their democratic rights in the election of their leaders is far more crucial.
They must also start to enjoy the benefits of democracy for which they toiled, sacrificed, and lost their lives during the protracted years of demonstrations and street battles against military rule.
It has been more than 24 years since democratic rule was reinstated in Nigeria, but Akinbode argued that it is debatable whether the country’s current system of government qualifies as a democracy or is simply civilian rule.
While there has been some noticeable progress towards a thriving multiparty democracy and regular elections, Nigeria’s track record of human rights violations has not significantly improved.
“Instead, Nigeria has since 1999 witnessed systematic attacks on democratic rights, attacks on the opposition, shrinking civic space, arbitrary arrests, illegal detentions, torture, and extrajudicial killings by security agents, as well as suppression of the rights to freedom of expression and assembly, violation of the principles of separation of powers, assault on the judiciary, and press freedom.More troubling is the habitual disregard for Chapter 2 of the 1999 Constitution (As Amended), which outlines the social contract between the State and the people with regard to the funding of public education, healthcare, living wages, and the provision of adequate jobs and shelter, by every elected government since 1999, whether at the federal or state level.
