The ECOWAS Community Court of Justice has found Nigeria liable for violating the rights of journalist Jide Oyekunle during the EndBadGovernance protests in Abuja and ordered the government to pay him N10 million in compensation.

In a judgment delivered on June 22, the regional court held that authorities breached Oyekunle’s rights to freedom of expression, personal liberty, dignity, protection from torture and degrading treatment, and the enjoyment of property, over his treatment by security agents while covering the protest at Eagle Square on August 1, 2024.

The court directed the government to report within three months on steps taken to implement the judgment and to bear the costs of the proceedings. Oyekunle, who heads the FCT Correspondents’ Chapel of the Nigerian Union of Journalists, had alleged that officers assaulted and unlawfully detained him, seized his phone for about eight hours and damaged his camera, and sought N505 million in damages.

The government denied the claims, arguing that the protest had turned violent and that the journalist’s temporary detention followed his refusal to obey lawful directives. The three-member panel, presided over by Justice Ricardo Cláudio Monteiro Gonçalves, dismissed that defence, holding that he was engaged in legitimate journalism on a matter of public interest and that the state showed no lawful basis for interfering or seizing his phone.

The court found his detention arbitrary in the absence of any warrant, and relied on video and photographic evidence to conclude that agents assaulted and dragged him, amounting to degrading treatment. It declined, however, to award special damages for the alleged camera damage and dismissed the privacy claim, citing insufficient evidence. The ruling stands as one of the court’s most significant recent pronouncements on press freedom.