A handful of youth on Thursday thronged the Moshood Abiola stadium, Abeokuta, the state capital to express their grievances and concerns on the economic hardship facing the country.
The #EndBadGovernance nationwide protest is scheduled to occur in all 36 states as well as the Federal Capital Territory between August 1 and August 10.
DAILY POST observed that youth who came in few numbers arrived at the stadium at at past 11 am carrying placards with various inscriptions such as “ Hunger is in the land” “ We are after peace and progress “ “ What is right INEC” “ I just want to live, stop suffocating” among others.
The Ogun State High Court on Wednesday had restricted the movement of the protesters to four different locations across the state.
The court also restricted the time frame of the protests to between 8 am and 5 pm.
The four locations chosen for the protest are the MKO Stadium, Abeokuta; Ansar-ud-Deen Comprehensive High School, Ota; Remo Divisional High School, Sagamu; and Dipo Dina Stadium, Ijebu-Ode.
At the venue of the protest, security operatives were deployed to heavily guard the location to forestall a breakdown of law and order.
The State Commissioner of Police, Abiodun Alamutu while addressing newsmen said the officers were on the ground to protect the protesters and help maintain peace and order.
“ Late yesterday evening a court order was received restricting protesters to certain locations for Abeokuta metropolis, the MKO Abiola stadium Kuto and that’s why you are seeing massive deployments here.
“We have to respect citizens’ rights, our reservation is that we don’t want miscreants to hijack this protest but good enough most of the organizers have seen reasons and voluntarily backed off from being part of the protest. But we are here to provide cover for them and allow them to exercise their constitutional right.
Also speaking, the state commander of the Nigeria Security and Civil Defense Corps, David Ojelabi, disclosed that the Ibadan garage at Ijebu Ode has about 20 youths who have also begun the peaceful protest.
One of the protesters, Jacob Ochigbo attributed the low turnout of protesters to the alleged threat from the government.
“I came here to protest because today is a day we agreed to lend our voices out against the unending and wrong policies because we are tired of the sufferings.
“The threat from the government prior to today is one of the factors why people are not here today, they kept making references to the ENDSARs protest forgetting that we’ve had other peaceful protests.
“You can’t continue to try to shut the people up by bringing wrong policies,” he added.
He appealed to Nigeria youths to fight for their rights saying that “nothing good comes easily if there are sacrifices to be paid definitely we have to be on the front line to make sure that we make these sacrifices for our children”
EndBadGovernance: Abeokuta youths throng MKO stadium to protest
