Ekiti Assembly to sue DSS, FG over lawmaker's 'unlawful' detention

dimeji akinloye

March 23, 2016 9:31 PM

He said members of the House read the news of the lawmaker's release online.

Honourable Akanni Afolabi

The

The House disclosed this to newsmen at a press conference held on Wednesday, March 23, 2016, at the its chamber in Ado-Ekiti, the state capital.

In his address, the chairman of the House Committee on Information, Youths and Sports, Chief Olugboyega Aribisogan, said that the DSS did not contact any stakeholder to inform them about Akanni's release on Tuesday (March 22) night.

Aribisogan said: “Up till this moment, we have not been told officially by the DSS whether or not Honourable Akanni was formally released from incarceration after spending 18 days without access to his doctors, lawyers and family members.

“However, preliminary information available to us suggests that Honourable Akanni may have been brought to the hospital by men of the DSS and abandoned there because they could no longer hold him in captivity because of his deteriorating health condition.

“Nigerians should be reminded that it took the rumour of Honourable Akanni’s death for the DSS to admit officially that it was holding him after spending 15 days in detention without access to anyone. As we speak, Honourable Akanni is in very critical condition and he has not been able to speak with anyone of us.

“We, therefore, demand an official explanation from the DSS as to why Honourable Akanni was abducted and held incommunicado for 18 days, only for us to be told that he was admitted in a private hospital in Abuja.

“Furthermore, we demand an explanation from the DSS whether in a democracy, it is part of its mandate to disobey court orders and dump Nigerians in detention for 18 days over unfounded allegations. “Most importantly, we condemn strongly the DSS illegal arrest, detention and dehumanization of Honourable Akanni and we demand an unreserved apology forthwith.

“We have also directed our counsel to seek redress and damages in court, because, to us, this act of impunity by the DSS under President Muhammadu Buhari is undemocratic, unpatriotic, dictatorial and brutish."

Pulse recalls that prior to Akanni's release on Tuesday, the Ekiti State Government had alarmed last week that the lawmaker had died in DSS custody. But the security agency dismissed the claim by presenting the legislator to journalists alive, but sick.

dimeji akinloye