Stories of the arrest of over a 100 women at nightclubs in Abuja, Federal Capital Territory have been circulating all over the internet. Now, when I first caught wind of the news of the arrest of 34 nude dancers about two weeks ago I honestly ignored it with the hope that someone in a position of power would call bullshit and let those women go seeing as we have bigger fish to fry as a nation. To my surprise or not really to be honest, this is Nigeria after all… not only were 70 more women arrested on Saturday the 26th of April by a ” joint task force”.

The authorities with their of faux righteousness and twisted morality have decided that “clubbing” by women in particular is now a criminal act and convinced themselves that they are indeed doing what’s best for society, various statements have been released in an attempt to justify the unlawful arrest of these women. Below is a tweet by a certain DCP Yomi Shogunle.

I have a lot to say so I’ll break it down into subheadings as usual.

Is Clubbing a Criminal Act?

NO! ( and that’s that on that)

Did the officials follow due process ? Who endorsed this ?

If you haven’t read my article on arrest and bail this would be the perfect time to do that.

To my knowledge, prostitution involves two people. The prostitute and the client patronising the prostitute. However, only women were arrested for being “scantily dressed” and not because they were caught in the middle of negotiating money for sex or anything along those lines. So I wonder what was the yard stick for those arrests ? How were they able to confirm that all those women are prostitutes? Well they weren’t sure and did not care in all honesty.

Side note: As Nigerians living in Nigeria we all know that police men are the most frequent clients of prostitutes, so all of this is rather awkward and pretentious.

It is worrisome to think that a highly ranked official gave the go ahead for such a a barbaric expedition, its scary to think that one moment you could be doing the maddest zanku and the next you’re in a dark smelly cramped up jail cell.

What exactly is the rationale and what do we stand to gain ?

I took my emotions out of the equation and still there is no reasonable rationale for the raids that have taken place these past couple of weeks. I watched a video a friend posted where a FEMALE representative of the social development secretariat attempted to justify ( because quite frankly she was spewing utter rubbish and was unable to make any justification) She stated that women clubbing was a distorted situation in dire need of fixing, seeing as women are the ones to ensure morality in society owing to the fact that they are caretakers and mothers. To say I am disappointed is an understatement, I’m also very embarrassed on her behalf.

How about we look at prostitution holistically, surely there would be no prostitutes if men were not patronising them. Assuming the authorities arrested a third of alleged prostitutes it still would not curb prostitution in any way, it would still go on maybe discreetly but never eradicated and that’s facts. We really should focus on the real issues we have as a country and if we must, deal with these petty problems later on.

Ethnic- religious agendas…

It is obvious that this is an outright plot of the authorities to control the activities of women in an attempt to further certain ethic and religious agendas. Nowhere in the Nigerian constitution or any other legal provision does it state that “clubbing” is a criminal act. If the FCDA, PEDA, police force and whoever else want to criminalise clubbing I believe they know steps to take to effect that. There have been hints of an agenda to Islamise the country and this is an indication that those rumours may indeed be true. I don’t wish to delve too much into this issue so let’s move on to the issues I have concrete facts about.

Fundamental Human Right Issues

The pertinent fundamental human rights that are being violated in this circumstance as contained in chapter 5 of the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria are;

• The right to dignity
• Right to liberty
• Right to peaceful assembly and association

Right to freedom of movement

Despite the fact that these laws are in place and outrightly stated, not laws that imply, like the law against prostitution. The authorities have disregarded their duty ensure that citizens of Nigeria should be given without negotiation without any preconditions the right to dignity, aswell as a right to move freely and form peaceful association. A large group of women were violently arrested and denied their right to dignity in custody

These women were arrested without following due process and are now in custody being forced to pay a fine of N3,000- 5,000 as some news outlets have reported or trade sex for bail. The most gruesome and heartbreaking part of all of this is that a number of them are being raped by police men who are using empty satchets of pure water as condoms. Not only have their bodies and minds been violated by these tragic events but their fundamental human rights have been grossly infringed by the people put in place to protect them

Classism

After reading various articles and renditions of what is going on online, I concluded that the worst thing you can be in Nigeria is a poor woman. The authorities targeted certain night clubs for the purpose of their witch-hunt. I mean, I have friends were having fun at Play Hilton on the same night and I’m pretty sure there were woman at Indigo in Sheraton. Why didn’t the police or FCDA go to any of those clubs? The answer is simple, the women at Caramelo were easy targets. They arbitrarily arrested them believing “no big man’s child will be there, nobody will look for these ones”. They thought wrong rich or poor married or unmarried, prostitutes or not they are people and deserve to be respected and treated with dignity.

Let my sisters go !

I am aware that my outrage is only a drop in an ocean. But I implore any one in a position of power to please work tirelessly in ensuring that these women are not unjustly persecuted. Sources also state that a huge number of them have pleaded “guilty” to the charges of prostitution made against them. Surely those pleadings were gotten under duress and therefore null and void according to our laws. I hope that the right people do what is necessary to ensure that the records of their guilty pleas are expunged.

Lastly, it is just blatantly wrong to treat people in such manner. My heart is breaking for all the women who were in custody, I cannot even begin to imagine how they must feel. Close your eyes for ten seconds and imagine yourself in this situation, imagine your sisters, daughters, wives, girlfriends in this situation. More than anything, this should be a wake up call to all of us to take a stand against injustice. It could happen to any of us

To the Men

I wish the men in the clubs helped them, I wish the club owners would take a stand against this injustice. But alas that’s just wishful thinking

#sayhernamenigeria

#Abujapoliceraidonwomen

Unfortunately, I don’t have much peace or love to give on this day.

Thanks for reading.

SM