Save Nigeria Group (SNG), a pro-democracy coalition, comprising civil society groups, activists, opposition politicians, opinion leaders and workers which marched through Abuja Nigeria’s Federal Capital on Tuesday, has resolved to adopt a more spontaneous strategy in protesting the long absence of President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua from the country.

The change of strategy would also affect its pressure on the Peoples Democratic Party-led government to agree to the swearing in of the vice president as acting president by invoking Section 145 of the 1999 Constitution.

In furtherance of the agenda, members of the SNG in Nigeria and the Diaspora have resolved to decentralize the protest marches by spreading them across three continents. The continents are Africa, Europe and North America (USA). The rally billed for London has been slated for today while those of Washington, USA and Lagos have been fixed for early next week Tuesday, tentatively, There will also be demonstrations in some state capitals in the country. All the protests are geared towards forcing the PDP-led government to respect the constitution and break the prevailing uncertainty pervading the polity as a result of the sustained absence of President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua from the country for over 52 days.

Daily Sun spoke exclusively with three leading organizers of the protests. Radical Lagos-based lawyer, Mr. Femi Falana, opposition politician, Alhaji Buba Galadima and the Publicity Secretary of Conference of Nigerian Political Parties (CNPP), Mr. Osita Okechukwu.
The SNG at its post rally meeting held at the Rockview Hotel, Abuja had adopted a resolution giving the National Assembly a week within which to write a letter to Mr. President to avail himself of section 145 of the constitution. Failure to do, they would commence the process of impeachment against the ailing president.”

The new strategy of the leaders is to make the demonstrations spring up spontaneously in different cities and continents in a manner that will not portray them as choreographed. Within the country, the group has also decided to organize and carry out its activities in a systematic manner that will leave no room for agents of government to divide the protesters by introducing the North-South dichotomy into its rank and file.
According to Falana, “ we want to show that this is not a southern affair or a religious affair. We want to prove that this country belongs to all of us and that we can together save Nigeria and save the future of our children.
The radical lawyer said, the National Assembly has betrayed Nigerians whom they claim to represent. He argued that rather than initiate the moves towards raising a medical panel to examine the medical condition of the president, the two chambers were busy constituting committees to pay him a get well visit while the country reels under a rudderless atmosphere.

According to the president of West African Bar Association (WABA), the civil groups, including the media have a responsibility not to allow the PDP to plunge the country into “an unwarranted constitutional crisis which we are all going to pay for.” He warned the ruling party not to stretch its luck too far, saying the opposition parties and civil society groups could have been asking for a government of national unity by now rather than allow the PDP to continue after the president elected on its platform had abandoned the ship of state with no one in charge for over 50 days.

Osita Okechukwu told Daily Sun that the SNG is non-partisan, non-tribal and non-religious. He said the group comprises civil society organizations, politicians, workers, professionals, traders, artisans and other interest groups. He stressed: “Our common template is that Nigeria is gradually sliding dangerously into a quasi-dictatorship and failed state instead of a democracy. The situation is worsened by the power vacuum created by the absence of Mr. President, for the fact that President Umaru Yar’Adua refused to protect, defend and uphold the constitution that brought him to power.

http://www.sunnewsonline.com/webpages/news/national/2010/jan/15/national-15-01-2010-01.htm

the article you quoted says nothing about your subject i.e 'protest spread to Lagos, Europe, US'

am interested in the follow up, but seems the organizers have become quiet after the Abuja protest and the supposedly Yaradua interview on bbc

Aluta Continua.,.,., Victoria Acerta,

OAM4J:

the article you quoted says nothing about your subject i.e 'protest spread to Lagos, Europe, US'

am interested in the follow up, but seems the organizers have become quiet after the Abuja protest and the supposedly Yaradua interview on bbc

Read the 3rd paragraph

amangla awetu

netpro:

Read the 3rd paragraph

ok. thanks. just hope we keep or improve the steam with which we started.