A lawyer, Bello Ibrahim, has threatened to commence committal proceedings against the Director General of the Department of State Security (DSS) over alleged unlawful detention of his client, Umar Ibrahim.
The lawyer, in a letter written to the DSS dated April 19, said the development followed the refusal of the security outfit to comply with an order of a Federal High Court (FHC), Kaduna, to release Ibrahim, a student of the Kaduna State University.
He alleged that Justice Hadiza Shagari of the Kaduna division of the FHC had, on Oct. 25, 2021 in a judgment, ordered the DSS to release the undergraduate from its custody forthwith.
Ibrahim, therefore, informed the DSS boss of the intention of his client to commence committal proceedings against him if the judgment is not executed.
The letter read in part: “We are solicitors to Umar Faruq Ibrahim hereunder called our client, the applicant in the fundamental rights proceedings: FHC/KD/CS/26/2021; between Umar Faruq Ibrahim Vs Department of State Service and on his behalf we write.
“A judgment was entered against your office on October 25, 2021 by the Federal High Court sitting in Kaduna, but your office has refused to comply with the express letter of the judgment hence this demand.
“We demand for execution of this judgment forthwith failing which we shall commence committal proceedings as the applicant has remain in detention without any charges far above the period envisaged by the law.”
Court documents showed that sometimes in Nov. 26, 2018, the DSS raided Unguwar Shanu quarters of Kaduna State, where the applicant was picked and brought to the headquarters of the agency and has been in detention since then.
The DSS had, during the hearing of the suit, told the court that the applicant was arrested on reasonable suspicion of having committed the offence of involvement in suspected activities of terrorism.
