The Policy and Legal Advocacy Centre has called on the National Assembly to institute a mechanism to address human rights violations in the country.

The centre Executive Director, Clement Nwankwo, made the call at a two-day consultative meeting on strategy for engaging the National Assembly Committees on Human Rights in Abuja on Tuesday.

Mr Nwankwo said at the meeting organised by the centre that the call was necessary to make the National Assembly respond to some of the gaps in human rights law.

According to him, the goal is to assure organisations involved in human rights protection that the National Assembly has a mechanism in place to respond to their policy and advocacy issues.

He expressed concern about the increasing cases of human rights violations in the country including the increasing cost of litigation.

This, according to him, is making it difficult for citizens to challenge human rights violations in court.

“It is important that the Senate and House Committee on Human Rights work out a mechanism to address the problem of human rights violations in the country,” he added.

He explained that the meeting was to bring civil society organisations and human rights organisations, working on human rights issues, to engage with the Human Right Committee in the Senate and House of Representatives.

“The goal is to work out a system of addressing human rights violations in the country. For the National Assembly, it is to see whether there are gaps in the laws and what needs to be done to address the gaps. It is also to see if civil society organisations will have the opportunity of taking their advocacies beyond the media to the legislature, the highest policy making body in the country. We also want to strengthen the working synergy between the National Assembly and human rights organisations,” Nwankwo said.

The executive director added that the Inspector-General of Police and other heads of security agencies have a lot of responsibilities in reorienting security personnel to respect human rights.

He explained that part of the responsibilities was to bring officials who violate human rights to account, create awareness and enlighten security personnel on the need to respect and protect human rights.

He described awareness creation as “very critical,” adding that Nigerians needed to know their rights and how to seek redress when such rights were violated and where to seek support.

Nwankwo said that the meeting was aimed at making civil society organisations working on human rights protection in Nigeria to review the current state of human rights.

“This meeting will also help us to identify the challenges associated with tackling rights violations and suggest areas of collaboration among CSOs to strengthen human rights protection,” he said.

The Chairman, House Committee on Human Rights, Abiola Makinde, commended PLAC for the initiative, noting the disturbing cases of human right violations in the country.

Mr Makinde said that the meeting would enable him to get feedback on human rights issues in the country from CSOs and find ways to address the challenges.

He said, “We are aware of these violations, but then prosecuting violators is a critical issue that I really want to look into, especially working with the Attorney General of the Federation. This is because we have seen several violations here and there. However, how many of them have ended up in jail? So, my job is to follow the rule of law, and to also ensure the participation of CSOs during my committee meetings so that we can probe the violations together and find lasting solutions.”(NAN)