Cape Town – A march against police brutality in Nigeria by the Nigerian community in Cape Town went ahead even though only eight people turned up.
The organisers speculated that fear of contracting Covid-19 during the resurgence of the pandemic led to the small turnout.
President of Nigerian Community Western Cape, Hilary Ojukwu, said: “There are approximately 5 000 Nigerians in the Western Cape area. I suspect with all the talk of a second wave of Covid-19, many were fearful of crowds and decided to stay away.
“We will organise another protest early next year, perhaps in January."
The protesters had planned to march from the Cape Peninsula University of Technology in Hanover Street to St George’s Cathedral to hand over the first of two petitions, but eventually drove there, escorted by police officers.
The petition handed over at the church was addressed to the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, leader of the Anglican Communion of churches.
At the church the group was met by the Bishop of Table Bay, Joshua Louw, who said: “I will pass your concerns to Archbishop Thabo Makgoba to respectfully forward to Archbishop Welby, with whom he is in touch. He will reply to you.”
March organiser Adeola Oyebade, of the group Frontline Africa, said: “We are writing to Welby because he had shown himself to be a friend of Nigeria’s President Muhammadu Buhari. Welby has ignored the killings of Christians in Nigeria, and he must now apologise."
The protesters planned to hand over the second petition to President Cyril Ramaphosa at Parliament, but nobody came forward to accept it on his behalf.
Oyebade said: “The petition to President Cyril Ramaphosa is addressed to him in his capacity as AU chairperson. It asks him to sanction the Nigerian government over the issue of cases of police brutality carried out by the notorious unit of the Nigerian police force, the Special Anti-Robbery Squad or Sars.”
Reached for comment a consular official from the Nigerian consulate in Johannesburg, Ola Olu said: “As long as the protesters were peaceful, we have no comment. The laws in South Africa allow peaceful protest and we can’t stop them if that is what they want to do.”
Cape Argus