Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) has accused the leadership of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and the Nigerian President Muhammadu Buhari of hypocrisy and double standard in the handling of the aftermath of the assassination of erstwhile strongman of Chad Idriss Déby.

The rights group said it expected ECOWAS, founded on the principles of economic prosperity of member-states anchored on the practices of democracy and constitutionalism, to insist on the smooth transitions of power in Chad after the unfortunate assassination of the President by rebels.

“The decision by the Chadian military to dissolve parliament and unilaterally annul the results of the election in which the election umpire had already announced the winners and first runner-up is to put it succinctly, a military coup,” HURIWA said.

It carpeted the leaders of ECOWAS for their apparent double speak in the case of Chad whereas the same ECOWAS stood vehemently and demanded civilian democracy in Mali when few months back, the Malian military junta struck and unseated the democratically elected President who subsequently resigned.

HURIWA recalled that ECOWAS had rejected the military coup in Mali and

ordered sanctions against its ringleaders.

However, the rights group in a release on Thursday by its National

Coordinator, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, and the National Media Affairs

Director, Ms Zainab Yusuf, expressed disappointment that ECOWAS has

now decided to apply a different yard stick in the case of Chad.

It demanded that the most appropriate approach would have been for

ECOWAS to insist that since the winner of the ill-fated poll in Chad has been killed, then his running mate or the first runner up in that election should be upgraded to the position of the winner instead of allowing the military to crush all democratic institutions just so they can install the son of the late leader who is a serving four star General.

HURIWA asked ECOWAS to similarly suspend the membership of Chad until the coup leaders return their nation to a path of constitutionalism.

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