The First Lady of Nigeria, Aisha Buhari was contended to have ordered the Nigerian Police to arrest an undergraduate for making a comment via Twitter over her body weight.
Aminu Muhammad, a 500 level undergraduate of the Federal University, Dutse twittered his comment in June and was later arrested for it on November 8, 2022.
While numerous have taken to Twitter to state their voices on the matter, the first question that clouded the space is what right the first lady has to order the arrest.
How does the first lady’s office came into actuality and what powers does she possess
The current constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria has no place and doesn’t fete the office of the first lady in Nigeria, still, chapeau office with no functionary status has backing and staff allocated to the woman whose husband subscribed to scrapping the office she so occupies as ‘Wife of the President’.
In 1985, a glamorous structure was erected and named the office of the first lady to accommodate the beautiful dark- barked woman who was wife of Nigeria’s military President, Mrs Maryam Babangida with end of handling a design tagged “ Better Life for Rural Women( BLRW) ”.
This design ultimately faded into oblivion towards the end of Ibrahim Babangida’s administration on 26 August 1993 but the office of the first lady survived the test of time to date with seven successors with the current president holder being Haijya Aisha Buhari addressed as “ Her Excellency ” following her hubby’s election as President of Nigeria serving two terms since 2015. It’s ironical that her hubby had declared that the Office of the First Lady won’t be honored in his government but the contrary obtains despite his crusade against the abuse of the office.
Rather of the cancellation as anticipated by Nigerians, Aisha Buhari and her platoon changed the name of the office to “Wife of the President ” while operating from the same office located beside the sanctioned hearthstone of the Presidential villa.
While General Buhari (Retd) has failed Nigerians with regard to his pledge to scrap the office of the first lady, the 1999 Constitution doesn’t give any right to the wife of the President or first lady to arrest and torture a Nigerian citizen.
Nigerians’ response and disclosure
Jaafar Jaafar, a Nigerian Publisher twittered that the wife of the President joined the security officers to severely torture the undergraduate to the extent of fracturing her legs.
Numerous activists and celebrities have joined to condemn the abuse of power by the Nigerian Police as well as Hajia Aisha Buhari. Everyone who has raised out on the issue has condemned the first lady’s action as rough and if there’s anything, Aisha Buhari could have filed charges against the undergraduate in court.
Inibehe Effiong, a human rights counsel, has said it’s petty, ridiculous, and unconstitutional for the SSS to arrest a citizen for “ mocking ” the wife of the President on social media. Nigeria isn’t Iran, North Korea, or China. We ’ll not tolerate similar reckless abuse of power. ”
SERAP has also joined other NGOs to call on the Buhari’s administration to incontinently release Aminu Muhammad unconditionally or prepare to face a legal action.
Dr. AdulMahmud twittered “ Reading the report of how Aisha Buhari tête-à-tête supervised the brutal assaults of two citizens, G.O had to search memory for a parallel in history. No First Lady has ever done what Aisha is contended to have done. But there’s a resemblance name of power abusing power ”
This isn’t the first time there’s an abuse of power over twitter commentary, Nigerians were denied access to the social media platform for 6 months after Twitter took down the tweet of President Muhammadu Buhari on Biafra in Nigeria.
