An assault on a nursing mother in an Abuja adult toy shop by Elisha Abbo, a senator, has provoked national fury, condemnation – including from his own party – and demand for justice. A video of Abbo’s action in the social media, which went viral, gave him away. Initially, he tried to deny the dastardly incident, which happened in March, when he was a senator-elect.
Representing Adamawa North-Central in the Senate under the umbrella of the Peoples Democratic Party, Abbo had gone to the shop with three ladies. One of them suddenly began to vomit intermittently to the dismay of the shop owner, who wondered aloud why she did not dash outside to do so since she was not a minor. But Abbo could not tolerate this innocuous protest. Bizarrely, he alleged that it was the store owner’s poisoning of the air conditioner that led to the lady’s abrupt illness. This unfounded charge further fuelled an exchange of hot words between the senator and the shop owner.
As the atmosphere became charged with the senator’s persistent threats, a friend and a nursing mother to the shop owner, who had watched the drama, decided to intervene. She pleaded with the senator to take things easy. By so doing, she stirred a hornets’ nest. Gratuitous insults of the women by Abbo were followed by a barrage of slaps. At the senator’s behest, his victims were arrested. The police officer attached to him was reinforced after a phone call he made to police authorities. This is the height of impunity and abuse of power, one of the worst advertisements of the Nigeria Police. The attached police officer – an officer of the law – ought to have waded into the matter to save Abbo from this grotesque, self-inflicted harm and public perception of him as a reprobate and a bully.
Under the country’s Penal Code, Sections 252 and 253, the senator should be prosecuted for assault; and if found guilty, be sentenced to one-year imprisonment in line with Section 351, or more if the victim was bodily harmed. On Thursday, Abbo arrived at the Federal Capital Territory Police Command for interrogation over the matter. This came on the heels of a directive of the Inspector-General of Police, Mohammed Adamu, that the case be thoroughly investigated. Protesters had stormed the Force Headquarters on Wednesday, demanding justice, which the police spokesman, Frank Mba, assured them would be done after investigation and forensic analysis of the video footage of the assault. He added that “the actions/inactions of the policeman seen in the video footage,” would not go unattended to.
Police authorities should be conscious of this: investigation should not take too much time since the suspect has admitted that he is, indeed, the assailant in the video footage and the truth that is self-evident therein. Accordingly, he has rendered a public apology. But his seeming remorse cannot usurp the place of the law. Human rights activists, women groups and those concerned about the entrenchment of civility in the society should make sure that this actionable offence is treated expeditiously. The Nigerian society is atrophied when cases like this are often swept under the carpet.
But in this case, justice must be served and swiftly too. When a lawmaker becomes a law breaker and goes scot-free, it helps to dim the dignity of the Senate as an institution. It does not happen in a flourishing democracy. In the United Kingdom, for instance, a Nigerian-born Member of Parliament, Fiona Onasanya, was tried and convicted for lying, to avoid a speeding charge in January this year. The Senate should steer clear of this matter with the committee it has set up to investigate it if the motive is to save Abbo. As a matter of fact, the case is strictly within the domain of police competence, as he was still a senator-elect when the incident happened, not a serving lawmaker.
It is disappointing that the police quite often compromise themselves by allowing highly-placed individuals in the society to use them to harass and intimidate their fellow citizens. It is not just the police officer seen standing idly by in the video footage that deserves an inquest and punishment; the additional officers recruited and their supervisor should not be spared either. Added to this fatuous mix is the failure of the Maitama Area Police Command, which Premium Times alleged the victims had reported the matter to, on May 14, but failed to act on it.
Instructively, the embattled senator appears to have an antecedent in violent behaviour contrary to his apology. “I have never been known or associated with such actions in the past,” he claimed. But a photo journalist, Olumuyiwa Owolabi, an aide to the immediate past governor of Ekiti State, Ayo Fayose, immediately countered him. He told this newspaper, “The viral video of (Senator Elisha) Abbo, assaulting a young lady isn’t new to me as I was one of his victims of assault years back.”
He stated that Abbo had hired him to cover his campaign in August 2014 for the party primaries ahead of the 2015 general election, but failed to pay him for services rendered. For daring to demand the agreed fee of N2.8 million, he allegedly damaged his phone, tore his cloth and branded him a Boko Haram member with a threat to get the police to kill him. He alleged that Abbo instructed his police aide to put him into a pick-up truck and point gun at him as they drove him to Kaliwa Police Station around 2 am.
Indeed, were the police personnel attached to Abbo in 2014 and currently, who did his bidding at the adult toy shop on official assignment? If so, it reinforces the popular advocacy for professionalism in the Force in its officers’ discharge of their duties. Are policemen obliged to obey illegal orders from civilians they are guarding? An Assistant Inspector-General of Police, Rasheed Akintunde, in charge of Zone 5 in Benin, said in 2018 that 80 per cent of police personnel guard “prominent people.” These officers have become a serious menace to the lives of the generality of Nigerians. There is hardly any IG in the past that did not promise withdrawing them to enhance the safety of the larger society. But none ever had the nerves to do so. In the case of Adamu, he vowed to cut down the number in February. Nothing has changed. Public office holders like Abbo, who unabashedly abuse this privilege, should be denied it henceforth.
