Lagos Police charge Sowore for Affray

UPDATE Regarding Panti

Once again, the Nigeria Police Force State Criminal Investigation Department (SCID) in Lagos has invited me to appear for an “interview” tomorrow, my birthday.  This time, they have indicated they plan to charge me for “Affray.”  In case you don’t know it, that is called “Two Fighting.”

For over a month since I was attacked by a subject working with a variety of interests, Lagos State Police Commissioner Fatai Owoseni has been plotting to ensnare me in a criminal litigation capable of bogging me down in Lagos, but the revolutionary spirit guiding this period can neither be stopped nor intimidated.

We are now aware that Mr. Owoseni took offense at the way he was exposed in the conspiracy leading to my attack and subsequent police abuse on January 11 and has since then tried to build a criminal case through the SCID.  We know that some willing officers have agreed to file charges except that they discovered they couldn’t file charges to sustain their initial laughable allegations of Criminal Libel, Extortion and Threat to Life.  It is on account of this that the CP and some other officers working actively with him decided, after an entire month, to file “Affray” charges against me.  The desperation is so serious that the person who carried out the attack is the proponent of the charges. Simply, he will be happy to stand in the dock charged for fighting with me.

That's the level to which policing has been reduced in Nigeria.

I repeat: I will answer the invitation of the police tomorrow, February 16, 2017, at 10 am at the Panti Police Station in Yaba, to answer their questions and face the charges. It has become necessary that a new movement emerges among Nigerians who are tired of police abuse; the abuse of men in uniform who think of themselves as God.

I am not afraid.  There is nothing to be afraid of.  Steve Biko wasn’t as old as I am when some desperate policemen tortured him to death in Apartheid South Africa. Malcolm X wasn’t as old when he was shot to death in Harlem for taking on white supremacy. Martin Luther King Jr. wasn’t as old, yet they shot and killed him for standing up for his convictions.

Don’t get me wrong: I do not qualify to be compared with any of those martyrs, but if these examples help you to understand what we are up against, please absorb them.

I know that these fellows are working in cahoots with some callous characters with a view to silencing me, but I do not plan to give up, even in death.