A former Chairman of the Nigerian chapter of Transparency International , Major General Ishola Williams ( retd) , has condemned Tuesday ’ s shooting of some unarmed protesters in the Lekki Tollgate area of Lagos .
Some youths staged protests in states across the country against police brutality and the excesses of men of the SARS , a unit of the Nigeria Police Force .
On Tuesday , unidentified soldiers who reportedly invaded the Lekki Tollgate were said to have shot at some of the protesters shortly before the commencement of a 24 -hour curfew imposed on the state by Sanwo - Olu .
Reacting to the incident during a telephone interview with one of our correspondents on Friday , Williams said , “ Any sensible person will condemn the act of soldiers shooting unarmed protesters ! Anywhere in the world , that is condemnable . If you obey an order to shoot at unarmed persons , you have committed murder . Period !”
He added that whoever gave the order to the soldiers had a responsibility for giving the order likewise those who obeyed the order .
Williams said , “ But obeying order alone is not enough to absolve the soldiers from the shootings . So, they are as guilty as the person who gave the order . ’’
He, however , noted that one could not know who to trust regarding the incident or if it happened or didn ’ t happen.
He stated , “ Therefore , the best thing for everybody is to wait for the judicial panel of enquiry set up by the governor on the matter . What is important about the panel is that the CCTV cameras at Lekki weren ’ t off and therefore recorded activities at the place , especially during the period that everybody is talking about . That recording, which is in video form , will tell us whether anyone was killed or not .
“ Obviously, people were injured because the governor said he visited injured persons in the hospital . When you accept that , it means there were shootings because people cannot be injured there if there were no shootings . ”
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