The legal body made this known through its National Publicity Secretary, Dr Rapulu Nduka, in an interview in Abuja on Wednesday.

The Minister of Information and Culture, Lai Mohammed has been knocked for ridiculing the report the Lagos State Judicial Panel of Inquiry on Restitution for victims of SARS-related abuses even before a white paper is released. 

The Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) while reacting through its National Publicity Secretary, Dr Rapulu Nduka, in an interview in Abuja on Wednesday said that the response by Mohammed means that the government doesn’t want to know the truth about what happened at the Lekki tollgate on October 20th 2020. 

Recall that the minister at a news conference in Abuja on Tuesday had described the leaked report as fake and a hoax, saying that the report was an “intimidation of the majority by a minority”. 

He stated that the report circulating in social media cannot be relied upon, saying the document was full of discrepancies and errors. 

The minister described the content of the report as “tales by moonlight”, insisting that there was no “massacre” at the Lekki toll gate on October 20, 2020. 

But in a chat with The PUNCH, the NBA spokesman stated that the Nigerian government is not open-minded about the Lekki shooting and does not want to accept its mistakes. 

He submitted the government’s dismissal of the report shows that it does not want to know the truth about what happened at the toll gate. 

He said, “From all indications, the Minister of Information has always given the impression that this event never took place and that is the impression that most people were given from day one. I was not there; so many people were also not there. The judicial panel was set up to uncover the truth.

“It is only normal that we depend on the outcome of the panel to know what truly happened.

“Condemning the report even before the issuance of the white paper shows that the government is not open-minded and does not want to know the truth about what happened at the toll gate.”

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