Pulse.ng : Center trains Katsina, Zamfara local communities on human rights abuse reporting

By Zubairu Idris

The Centre for Democratic Development, Research and Training (CEDDERT), has trained Katsina and Zamfara States local communities on information gathering and documentation of human right abuses, to enable the government check the menace effectively.

The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the training, supported by the Amnesty International, has traditional rulers, religious leaders, youths, women groups, and Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) as participants.

The Centre’s Director of Research, Prof. Massoud Omar, said on Thursday in Katsina, that the training would assist in exposing more forms of human right abuses in local communities of the respective states.

He said that centre was specifically set up to look at community problems, conduct research, proffer solutions and advice the government.

The director explained that their findings revealed a lot of human right abuses in local communities, coupled with banditry bedeviling the two states.

“We are enlightening the communities more on their rights, and strengthen them on how to go about information gathering and documentation for the government to take necessary action,” Omar said.

He stated that unless the local communities open up, the government would not know some of those problems, hence the need for the center to sensitise the locals in that regard.

According to him, before the government could address any societal problem, communities have role of informing the government on their challenges.

One of the participants, Salihu Ibrahim, said that the training would assist them in exposing perpetrators of human right abuse in their respective communities.