The Federal High Court, Abuja Division, on Wednesday, dismissed a suit seeking to stop FCT minister Nyesom Wike and the Abuja Environmental Protection Board from arresting and prosecuting commercial sex workers in Abuja.

Justice James Omotosho held that the plaintiff’s application was incompetent under the Fundamental Rights (Enforcement Procedure) Rules, 2009.

The judge held that even if it was competent, “the reliefs sought are not grantable, and thus, it is hereby dismissed for lack of merit.”

The plaintiff, under the auspices of the Incorporated Trustee of Lawyers Alert Initiative for Protecting the Rights of Children, Women and the Indigent, had instituted the suit.

The group sued the AEPB, FCT minister, Federal Capital Territory Administration and the attorney general of the federation as first to fourth respondents, respectively.

In the suit dated and filed on May 14, 2024, by a team of lawyers led by Rommy Mom, Bamidele Jacobs and Victor Eboh, the group sought two questions.

The lawyers prayed the court to determine whether the duties of the AEPB under Section 6 of the AEPB Act, 1997, extend to the harassment, arrest, detention and prosecution of women suspected of engaging in sex work on the streets of Abuja.

They sought a declaration that the charge made by the personnel of the AEPB before the FCT Mobile Court, which referred to arrested women suspected of engaging in sex work as ‘articles’ and considered their bodies as ‘goods for purchase,’ is discriminatory and violated the provisions of Section 42 of the 1999 Constitution.

The lawyers, therefore, asked the court for an order restraining the AEPB, its agents or privies from harassing, arresting and raiding women suspected of engaging in sex work on the streets of Abuja.

“I daresay that prostitution is and has never been part of our culture. Prostitution or ‘olosho’ and ‘ashewo’ as the Yorubas call it, ‘akwuna-akwuna’ as the Igbos call it, ‘karuwa’ as the Hausas call it or ‘hookup’ as the young people say it, is alien to our culture,” said the judge.

The judge added, “It has been frowned upon as a deeply immoral act worthy of shame. The fact that civilisation and westernisation has taken some root in Nigeria still does not make it right. Even in some Western countries, prostitution is still seen as an immoral act.

“In the United States of America, for instance, apart from a few counties in the state of Nevada, prostitution or sex work is illegal in the other 50 states of the U.S.

“There is absolutely no justification for prostitution in Nigeria in the context of our cultural norms and tradition, and in fact, prostitution is an anathema in Africa.”

The judge held that the prostitutes which the group sought to protect “are vagabonds” and the AEPB is well within its right to arrest and prosecute them as they constitute a nuisance in the FCT and are clearly committing an offence by parading themselves as “women of easy virtue.”

“I, therefore, hold that this application filed by the applicant has no basis and the rights claimed are unenforceable in light of the provisions of Section 45 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended) and the Preamble to the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights. 

“This court wonders what kind of message the applicant was sending when it decided to bring an action to protect prostitutes,” ruled the judge.

He added, “A reasonable person would have expected that the applicant would instead occupy itself with developing the girl child and protecting the sanctity of womanhood instead of promoting immorality and the spread of sexual diseases.”

(NAN)