Senator Yusuf Datti Baba-Ahmed, Vice Presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP), has called for the immediate release of the detained undergraduate of the Federal University, Dutse, Jigawa State, Aminu Mohammed.
Nigeria’s First Lady, Aisha Buhari, had ordered the arrest and detention of Aminu Muhammed over alleged defamatory Social Media post.
Muhammed, who is a final-year student in the Department of Environmental Management and Toxicology, Federal University Dutse, Jigawa State, had in June tweeted in Hausa “Su mama anchi kudin talkawa ankoshi” loosely translated as “the mother has gotten fatter by eating masses’ money.”
As gathered, Aminu had tweeted to express displeasure over the then prolonged strike action of the Academic Staff Union of Universities as a result of the failure of the Federal Government to honour its agreement with the union.
Addressing a press conference in Abuja on Thursday, Baba-Ahmed said citizens had the right to criticizse the government without fear.
“While we will never as a party condone indecorous speech and disrespect to elders, we wish to remind the Buhari State House that they rode to power on the personal denigration of their opponents and empty promises without slightest clues of good governance.
“Individuals must be free to express themselves freely and any infraction of law be pursued as civil matter and not through high-handed abuse of power. This is not 1984. We lend our voice to the genuine calls for his immediate release,” he said.
President Muhammadu Buhari was the military Head of State in 1984, but his regime, which was accused of poor human rights record, was toppled in 1985.
