To truly #EndSARS , others policies have to be fixed in place by govt. These include constituting the governing council of @NhrcNigeria as @falzthebahdguy pointed out a couple of days ago.

Permit me to use this thread to explain why the NHRC is an important element in all these.

The NHRC - Nigeria's National Human Rights Commission - falls under the kind of entities known as National Human Rights Institutions (NHRIs).

NHRIs can come in the form of commissions, ombudsman, truth/reconciliation panels, or a hybrid of these

In 1993, the General Assembly of the UN adopted the ‘Principles Relating to the Status of National Institutions’. We call these The Paris Principles.

The Paris Principles direct that a real NHRI must be independent and have autonomy from executive or legislative influence.

Principally, the roles of the NHRI are to:

- protect citizens on human rights issues: receiving complaints, investigating issues, public hearings, etc

- promote human rights issues: public awareness, education and training of govt officials, advising govt on human rights, etc

Nigeria has had an NHRI since 1995, in the form of the @NhrcNigeria.

However, our NHRC did not become fully compliant with the Paris Principles until its amendment law in 2010. Under the 2010 law, the NHRC is directed by a governing council who oversee an executive secretary.

The NHRC is an autonomous entity from the govt. Although the governing council is selected by the President, it is meant to operate on its own. Its capacity includes investigating all of the human rights violations by members of the govt itself - especially security forces.

For a very brief period in Nigeria - following the amendment law in 2010 and up until 2015, we had an NHRC that was getting awake to its responsibilities. At this period, the governing council was headed by @ChidiOdinkalu - who as we all know, does not pander to politicians.

During that period, a lot of people - including myself - would refer police issues to the NHRC for swift resolution. One of the most vivid examples was the #FreeCiaxon incident where the NHRC helped secure the release of a man who had been abducted by the DSS.

I suspect the govt saw a threat in having a really vibrant NHRC doing the work it ought to be doing. And so, at the end of @ChidiOdinkalu's term, after Buhari came to power in 2015, they simply refused to constitute a new governing council and left the commission directionless.

Today, the NHRC still exists: it still has an Executive Secretary, Commissioners, and other staff - but these are all career workers. And we know how easy it is for the govt to intimidate career workers. In the absence of an autonomous governing council, the NHRC has become tame.

I suspect this is also why in the last three years, many Nigerians have had to rely on one individual to sort out their policing problems - because the govt weakened the institutional solution.

To #EndSARS , we must also get the NHRC up and running independently once again.

In the coming years, whenever anyone is arbitrarily arrested or unlawfully killed by the police, their families/friends should be able to contact the NHRC office in their state for a speedy intervention. This is part of their duties: they must get back to being able to do this.

For those who want to learn more on the role of NHRIs, check these out:

(Global) https://www.ohchr.org/Documents/Countries/NHRI/1950-UNDP-UHCHR-Toolkit-LR.pdf

(Africa) https://www.africa.undp.org/content/dam/rba/docs/Reports/State%20of%20Africa%20NHRIs%20Study%20Report%20(English).pdf

(Nigeria)
https://www.nanhri.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/04/NIGERIA.pdf