Despite two court orders directing the Department of State Services, DSS, to release Omoyele Sowore, after meeting his bail conditions on both occasio
Despite two court orders directing the Department of State Services, DSS, to release Omoyele Sowore, after meeting his bail conditions on both occasions, the secret police says it is yet to release the pro-democracy campaigner and Publisher of Sahara Reporters, from its detention facility in Abuja because it doesn’t want him to get knocked down by a vehicle on his way out.
Spokesperson for the agency, Peter Afunanya, said Sowore’s lawyer, Femi Falana (SAN), was yet to come fetch him from their facility. Afunanya said, “We cannot just release Sowore and ask him to go because he may be knocked down by a vehicle at the gate.”
Afunanya noted that Falana had not been to the headquarters of the service since the activist was granted bail, a claim the popular rights lawyer vehemently rejects. Afunanya claimed that the DSS was following administrative procedures by asking the sureties to come forward for proper documentation. He said, “We respect rules and orders of the court and there was never a time the Director-General said he would not release Sowore
But Falana says DG of DSS, Yusuf Bichi, had stopped taking his calls.
“I confirm that I have an official relationship with the DG of SSS. But since the commencement of the case of Sowore and Bakare, the DG has refused to pick my calls while I have since become a persona non grata in the office of the SSS,” Falana said.
Sowore was arrested in Lagos on August 3, 2019 for calling on Nigerians to take to the streets in peaceful demonstrations to demand a better country from President Muhammadu Buhari’s administration.
