By Ikeugonna Eleke
A Charity Foundation and Equal Rights group based in America, Tilova for Africa, has said it will pay for services of lawyers who will defend the rights of native doctors arrested and detained by the Anambra State Government.
The Chief Executive Officer of Tilova for Africa, Mr Martins Nwabueze, said this on Monday while reacting to the arrest and detention of some native doctors by the state government as part of efforts to tackle insecurity.
The Anambra State Government had recently begun a clampdown on native doctors who were deemed to be preparing get-rich-quick charms and protective charms for criminals, leading to the arrest and detention of notable native doctors.
But while reacting to this, Nwabueze described the arrest and detention of persons on the basis of their religion or trade under the guise of fighting insecurity by the Anambra Government, as unjust profiling.
‘As a Foundation, we shall work to ensure that these people enjoy equal rights like others, so, we a volunteering to provide free legal services for these people
‘We are aware of the enormous safety concerns in Anambra but we should not allow the cyber antics of are few clowns parading as native doctors to make us enact laws that could impact the way of life and belief system of a people negatively,’ he said.
The Activist said Nigeria was a secular state where everyone had rights to practice their religion or ply their trade without discrimination, intimidation, humiliation or scapegoating.
He said traditional medicine practice was an age long profession which existed in many African societies and should not be abolished in Anambra because of what he called presumptive evidence.
Nwabueze said his group was in total support of whatever would bring peace and security in Anambra but insisted that nobody or group should be discriminated against because of their religion.
He urged the Anambra State Government to release the native doctors if there was no evidence against them instead of keeping them perpetually in detention.
‘Tilova for Africa has followed the development in Anambra State with concern, while we support the governor on the effort to make the state safe and secure, we condemn the crackdown on indigenous religious practices in the state.
‘The arrest and continued detention of over 30 native doctors by the Anambra Government just because the government presumes that they prepare charms for criminals is not good.
‘This type of crime fighting is primitive and unacceptable in 21st Century Nigeria, we support the government to arrest crime and not content creators.
‘We invite native doctors that need our free representation to reach out to us through our website:www.tilovaforafrica.com,’ he said.
Nwabueze called on Soludo to invest in tech driven security architecture with adequately trained manpower to ensure that only culprits were arrested, detained and prosecuted.
