A spokesperson for the Nigerian police told PREMIUM TIMES he would find out why the former militant leader was yet to be arrested like others who committed similar offences.
Many Nigerians who believe in a famous legal principle, "equality before the law," must have thought that the country's authorities would immediately arrest Asari Dokubo, a former Niger Delta Militant, for brandishing rifles in a video clip.
But they were wrong!
More than eight months after the clip surfaced online, Mr Dokubo was yet to be arrested or summoned for questioning.
Instead, the former militant leader has been hobnobbing with the country's authorities despite brandishing the rifles in clear violation of Nigerian law.
The video clip began trending on 18 June, about four days after he met with President Bola Tinubu at the Presidential Villa, Abuja, whom he supported during the 25 February presidential election.
But an independent investigation by PREMIUM TIMES found that Mr Dokubo released the clip in late September 2022, but it first went viral days later in October, about eight months ago.
The clip appeared on a YouTube page on 1 October 2022.
The viral clip
In the video clip, Mr Dokubo was heard calling the Igbos "slaves", whom he said he would have continued to "sell" if not for the intervention of the British government.
The former militant leader, who spoke on varied issues, brandished two AK-47 rifles while threatening to kill all Igbos, an ethnic group predominant in Nigeria's South-east.
Mr Dokubo is a Kalabari, a part of the Ijaw ethnic nationality in Rivers State, Nigeria's South-south.
The former militant leader equally mocked the Igbos, saying they were "dying" in large numbers.
"You will do a video to sell that Alhaji has run away? Are you seeing me? I don't run," Mr Dokubo stated, apparently referring to himself, as he brandished the AK-47 rifle.
"Una head no correct," he spoke in Pidgin English, while picking and brandishing another AK-47 rifle.
"E be like say una dey look for who go finish una? Look for una everywhere (and) finish una. Una dey see me?" he stated in Pidgin English, threatening Igbos.
When translated into English, the expression means, "Is like you people (Igbos) are looking for who will kill you all? Someone who will hunt for you everywhere and kill all of you."
Is Dokubo above the law?
No person shall have in his possession or under his control any firearm or ammunition except with a license from the president or the inspector-general of police, according to Nigeria's Firearms Act No 32 of the 1959 CAP F28 LFN 2004.
Offenders face a minimum of ten years imprisonment on conviction.
Various persons have been arrested and prosecuted for illegally possessing firearms or making ethnic slurs on social media.
The police in Abuja, for instance, arrested a pastor of the House on the Rock Refuge Church, Uche Aigbe, in February after a video clip of him carrying an AK-47 rifle during a Sunday church service went viral on social media.
The police would later charge the pastor at a magistrate court in Abuja with conspiracy to commit murder, illegal possession of prohibited firearms, inciting disturbance and criminal intimidation.
Mr Aigbe, through his lawyer, said he got the firearm from a police officer posted to the church and had only used the firearm for an illustration while preaching a sermon about faith in the church.
The police said the offence was punishable under Section 111 of the Firearms Act CAP F28, LFN 2004 and contravened Sections 97, 114 and 397 of the Penal Code.
The case was still ongoing as of the time of this report.
Also, the police in Osun State, on 16 June, arrested a social media user who made anti-Igbo tweet.
"Let's kill all the Igbos. Let's flush them out of Yoruba lands. I hate these people with passion. They are violent people. They are the worst. They hate us. Let's hate them without holding back," the police quoted the suspect as posting on his Twitter handle on 18 May.
The police said the Twitter post violated social media policy on hate speech.
Mr Dokubo, in the viral clip, violated both the social media policy on hate speech and the firearm act as well as the penal code. But he was yet to be arrested or summoned by the Nigerian Police.
When contacted, the force spokesperson, Olumuyiwa Adejobi, told PREMIUM TIMES that he would find out why the former militant leader was yet to be arrested or prosecuted like others who committed similar offences.
Mr Adejobi, a chief superintendent of police, promised to revert to this newspaper with answers.
But he was yet to do so several days after.
Lawyers react
Stanley Alieke, an Abuja-based legal practitioner, told PREMIUM TIMES that Mr Dokubo, as a civilian and non-security agent, was not permitted by the law to possess a "combatant weapon" such as an AK-47 rifle.
"Possession of firearms is in itself a crime," Mr Alieke said, adding that even a combatant was not allowed to have a firearm outside his duty post without permission from his superiors.
The lawyer, however, said the principle of equality before the law has been a cliché used in courts of law but is not practicable, especially in Nigeria.
He said, like Mr Dokubo, other people who have issued threats and made ethnic slurs in the country in the past were yet to be prosecuted.
"It's unfortunate," he said of non-prosecution of offenders.
"Only licensed gun holders can carry guns. And there is the type of gun you can be given a licence for. It's for hunting purposes," said Monday Ubani, an Abuja-based lawyer and chairman of the Section on Public Interest and Development Law conference of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA).
Sign up for free AllAfrica Newsletters
Get the latest in African news delivered straight to your inbox
"It's only the security agencies that can carry AK-47 rifles," he said.
Mr Ubani said the fact that the police had not arrested Mr Dokubo suggests that the principle of equality before the law was not practicable in Nigeria.
"It's clearly illegal," the lawyer said of Mr Dokubo's brandishing of rifles and threatening of the Igbos.
"If it is true that a Nigerian citizen brandished a gun, threatening a whole race, I think the security agencies should be up and doing in effecting an arrest of that individual and bringing him to justice."
He regretted that there is "extreme lawlessness" in Nigeria and that some people were not prosecuted when they violated the law because of their role in bringing the leaders to power.
For Bulus Atsen, another legal practitioner, the arrest of Mr Dokubo by Nigerian authorities was unlikely despite "clearly violating" the law.
"I said so because here in Nigeria, even though the general principle is that nobody is above the law, times and times again, we have seen where the application of the law is done in a manner that favours some people over others," Mr Atsen, a former chairperson of the NBA in Abuja, said.
The lawyer said the authorities may have ignored Mr Dokubo because of possible "economic implications" his arrest would cause.
He cited Mr Dokubo's role in ending militancy in the Niger Delta region and involvement in protecting crude oil pipelines in the region.
