President Muhammadu Buhari on Monday gave legal teeth to the Sunday’s declaration of a lockdown of Abuja, the nation’s Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Lagos and neighbouring Ogun states to curb the spread of COVID-19 disease.
The development, came against the backdrop of the position of some lawyers, claiming that the President had no powers to impose a curfew on any state in Nigeria without recourse to the National Assembly and therefore his declaration of a lockdown on the three states was illegal.
Femi Adesina, presidential spokesman, who conveyed the action, said the President, acted in the exercise of the powers conferred on the president by Sections 2, 3 and 4 of the Quarantine Act (CAP Q2 LFN 2004), and all other powers enabling him in that behalf.
The statement, read: “In exercise of the powers conferred on him by Sections 2, 3 and 4 of the Quarantine Act (CAP Q2 LFN 2004), and all other powers enabling him in that behalf, President Muhammadu Buhari, Monday, signed the Covid-19 Regulations, 2020, which declared Covid-19 a dangerous infectious disease.
“The Regulations, effective March 30, 2020, also gave legal backing to the various measures outlined in the President’s National Broadcast on March 29, 2020, such as Restriction/Cessation of Movement in Lagos, FCT and Ogun State and others toward containing the spread of the pandemic in the country.
“In addition, to ensure that Nigerians can still perform on-line transactions and use ATMs whilst observing these restrictions, exemption is granted financial system and money markets to allow very skeletal operations in order to keep the system in light operations during the pendency of these regulations.”
