Twenty victims who suffered violations of their human rights in the hands of officers and men of the defunct Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS), have been compensated by the Human Rights Commission (HRC).
The Independent Investigative Panel on human rights violations which had its inaugural sitting in November 2020 and received 297 petitions from across 29 states including the FCT, went through cases of illegal arrests, extrajudicial killings, torture, unlawful prolonged detention, among others.
According to Secretary of the panel, Hillary Ogbonna, 144 cases have been concluded while the rest have not been touched. 25 cases were struck out, while 12 were withdrawn.
The compensations range from between N500,000 to about N10 million. In total, N146m have been disbursed to the victims so far, with more expected as several other cases are finalized.
The panel assured the victims that the perpetrators will face justice, despite the compensation, as the Attorney General of the Federation will charge them to court.
