Ms Maryam Isah Shehu, a Kano-based blogger and final-year student of Bayero University, was on August 20, 2026, ordered to be remanded in Suleja Prison by Justice Joyce Abdulmalik of the Federal High Court, Abuja, following her arraignment by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) on a cybercrime charge arising from her post on a social media platform.
According to reports, Maryam, a final-year student due to start her final exams in a few days, had been in detention for over a month and reportedly denied bail.
An amended charge by the EFCC dated August 20, 2026, reads: “That you Maryam lsah Shehu on or about 21st June 2026, at Abuja, within the jurisdiction of this Honourable Court, intentionally sent a message by means of a social network service via your Instagram account (@maryam_shehu) containing a message which was intended to tarnish the reputation of the Economic and Financial Climes Commission, when you published that EFCC officials assault (sic) Ahmed Uthman under the instruction of a Zonal Director who allegedly collected N20,000,000.00 (Twenty Million Naira) from one Usman Iya Abbas and you thereby committed an offence contrary to Section 24(2)(c) of the Cybercrimes (Prohibition, Prevention, Etc) Act. 2015 (As Amended) 2024 and punishable under Section 24(2)(c)(ii) of the same Act.”
She had pleaded not guilty when the charges were read to her.
Reports have it that she was lured by an EFCC official with a business offer in Kano before being arrested and moved to Abuja.
The judge adjourned the case to August 31, and asked that she be remanded in Suleja Prison.
On August 21, the EFCC Chairman, Mr Olanipekun Olukoyede, ordered the withdrawal of charges against her. The anti-graft agency said, in a statement, that Mr Olukoyede considered the “passionate pleas and apologies of Shehu’s father and appeals of well-meaning Nigerians for leniency”.
To this end, he directed that charges filed against her be dropped, warning that the EFCC would no longer tolerate any willful attack on its image in any form, medium or platform.
