The Executive Director of the Centre for Free Speech, Richard Akinnola has condemned the arrest of human rights lawyer, Dele Farotimi by operatives of the Nigerian police.
The Commissioner of Police in Ekiti State, Mr Adeniran Akinwale, had said that Farotimi was arrested for various alleged offences.
He said that the offences committed included “defamation of character, cyberstalking, and other things. But those two are fully established”.
While condemning the arrest, Akinnola, a journalist and lawyer said whoever feels maligned should seek redress in court rather than using police to harass critics.
He wrote “Last week, l was at a programme organised by Wole Soyinka Centre for Investigative Journalism on the shrinking civil space”.
“One of the take aways of that meeting was a decision calling for the decriminalisation of freedom of expression, particularly with the abuse of the criminal defamation law, which is on all fours with the Sedition law which has been nullified by the Court of Appeal in the case of Arthur Nwankwo v. The State (1985) 6NCLR 228”.
“Anyone who feels maligned or defamed should be free to approach the court to seek for damages. Of recent, the criminal defamation law has been subject of abuse, particularly by the “powerful” in the society who use the police as a ready tool against critics, no matter how well-intentioned the criticism is. It is on this score that l deprecate the harassment and arrest of Dele Farotimi”.
