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Nigeria: Police Arrest, Detain Newspaper Publisher
On May 2, 2005,
Omo-Ojo Orobosa, the publisher of the "Midwest Herald" newspaper was
arrested in Lagos on charges of sedition while the Lagos office of the
tabloid was sealed off. He was reported taken by the police to Akure, the
Ondo State capital, about 300 kilometres away, where he was initially
detained before being taken to Abuja.
Orobosa's
lawyer, Mr. Festus Keyamo, said he was arrested by detectives from the "D"
Department of the Ondo State Police Command, allegedly on the orders of
Mrs. Stella Obasanjo, Nigeria's first lady.
Orobosa reportedly arrived at his office to meet a team of policemen, led
by an inspector of police, Sunday Owolabi, waiting for him. The policemen,
who had cordoned off the office in Ikeja, Lagos, introduced themselves as
officers from "D" Department, Criminal Investigation Department (CID) in
Akure and said they received orders from the first lady to arrest Orobosa
over a publication in the previous week's edition of "Midwest Herald"
titled "Greedy Stella".
The story
alleged Mrs. Obasanjo was involved in selling government houses to her
relatives at less than the market value, accusing her of greed by the act.
Although they had no warrant of arrest, the policemen took Orobosa away on
allegations of having committed the offence of sedition and subsequently
drove him to Akure. On May 3, he was taken to Abuja where he is currently
being detained.
Mr. Keyamo condemned the arrest, saying "If the first lady feels defamed,
her recourse should be to the law courts for civil defamation, and not
recourse to the well known (late General Sani) Abacha tactics. We call for
the immediate release of Omo-Ojo, while we proceed to court to enforce his
fundamental rights."
But Mr. Ayodeji Amusa, spokesman for Mrs. Stella Obasanjo, said he was not
aware of the arrest. He claimed that Mrs. Obasanjo would have told him if
the story of the arrest was true.
When MRA visited
Festus Keyamo on May 5, he disclosed that Mr. Omo-Ojo has been questioned
by the Inspector General of Police on the said story. He added that Mr.
Omo-Ojo is being detained incommunicado: his cell phone has been taken
away from him and visitors are not allowed to see him. He has also not
been formally charged to a law court.
Keyamo said he
believes the Police is deliberately detaining him in order to punish him.
He revealed that his chambers was already preparing the legal documents to
challenge Orobosa’s detention.
He was released on May 13, after 12 days in custody without
formal charges. He was reportedly released on the orders of the
Inspector-General of Police, Sunday Ehindero.
Addressing a press conference in Lagos to announce his
release, Omo-Ojo said after his arrest, he was driven from Lagos to the
Force Criminal Investigation Department (FCID) in Abuja, where he was kept
in dehumanising conditions in one of the cells there called Liberation
Centre.
Describing his experience while in detention, he said "I
was crammed into cell inhabited by hardened criminals, including the
self-confessed killers of erstwhile All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP)
chieftain, Marshall Harry, about 42 of us in a small room meant for four
persons."
He added that: "We (inmates) were kept in perpetual
darkness, the toilet facilities were bad with human waste oozing from the
system and on my third day in the cell, policemen stormed our cell,
seizing everything from us, including a lantern, candles, plastic plates
and spoons and we were told to eat from our hands."
Omo-Ojo said shortly after his arrest, he was offered a
conditional release if he agreed to turn in the newspaper's assistant
editor, Philipson Abah, whose byline accompanied the controversial story.
But he said he rejected the offer.
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