Alleged Disobedience Of Court On Emefiele: Lawyers Move To Commit DG, DSS To Prison
About 60 Constitutional and Human Right lawyers on Monday filed contempt charge at an FCT High Court against the Director General of the Department of State Services, Mr Yusuf Bichi over what they described as ‘disobedience to multiple judgments and orders.
The lawyers noted that the courts have directed the release of the suspended Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Governor, Mr Godwin Emefiele from custody of the agency by the agency is still keeping him.
The contempt charge is seeking to commit the DSS DG to prison in line with provisions of the law on violation of lawful order of a competent court.
The team of lawyers led by Mr. Maxwell Opara and Barrister Abdulazeez Ahmed Tijani, are praying the court to commit DSS DG to prison until he purges himself of contempt of court.
In their Motion filed before the Court for the issuance of Form 48 and 49 which to enable them commence proceedings to commit a contemnor to prison, the lawyers said by the judgments and orders of Justice M. A. Hassan, Justice Hamza Muazu and Justice Bello Kawu, were more than enough for the DG DSS to have released Emefiele from detention.
In the affidavit in support of the application, the lawyers deposed to the fact Justice Hassan restrained the respondents in that suit, particularly, the State Security Service from arresting, detaining, or interrogating Emefiele for offences connected to terrorism financing, money laundering, round tripping, financial crimes of national security dimension among others.
The legal practitioners said that in spite of clear and positive orders of Justice Hassan, the State Security Service still went ahead to arrest and detained Emefiele for over a month while shopping for evidence.
Addressing newsmen after filing their processes at the Registry of the Court, Mr. Opara said the group will pursue the matter to its logical conclusion and ensure that Bichi is sent to prison so as to serve as a deterrent to other heads of security agencies and top government officials that contemptuous of court and gross abuse of their offices for personal vendetta.
Opara also called on President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to immediately relieve Bichi of his appointment as DG SSS for having allegedly misled the President that Emefiele had committed heinous crimes against the State only for him to now file a charge of unlawful possession of firearms.
He further said; “Is it not clear enough to Nigerians that the SSS is persecuting Emefiele if after holding him for 5 weeks they can only file a ridiculous charge of possessing a pump action gun?
“If possessing a validly registered pump action gun is a crime worthy of being held in perpetuity, what has the SSS done to the person threatening Nigerians from a particular section of the country with an assault rifle?
“This clearly shows the travail of Emefiele is more of political reasons than for any other. Assuming there was no valid court order, since the DSS had been unable to find any evidence against Emefiele, he was entitled to his release and how much more now that three different courts have ordered his release, the SSS is still holding him in unlawful detention and violating all his rights,” he said.
