Kingdom Okere, the convener, Lawyers in Defence of Democracy, has claimed that the actions of the Department of State Security (DSS) against the suspended governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Godwin Emefiele, are founded on falsehood and are illegal.
In an interview with ARISE NEWS on Friday, Okere said that in a press conference that was held by Lawyers of Defence in Democracy in 2022, the speakers revealed that “the DSS is about to frame this man up for what they have alleged to be terrorism financing, and some financial crimes of national security dimensions.”
Okere revealed that in December 2022, Dr. M.A Hassan of the FCT High Court had ordered the DSS to refrain from proffering charges of terrorism financing against Emefiele, however, he was charged with this charge when the DSS had not gone to an appeal court to appeal the decision. He said, “The rule of law does not empower the DSS to disregard an order of a court of competent jurisdiction.
The only thing they can do within their constitutional rights is to go to a higher court, an appellate court, to set it aside. So far as that judgement remains, whatever they are doing in purporting to file any charge against Emefiele, it remains illegal ab initio.”
He then claimed that the DSS could not find any evidence against Emefiele, as he said that the time frame for an arrested person to be charged when there is a court of competent jurisdiction within a radius of 4 kilometres is within two days.
However, the DSS kept Emefiele in custody for almost a month, which led him to conclude that there was no evidence of the charges that they levelled against Emefiele.
“There is no account traceable to Emefiele that is financing terrorism that they have found, and I stand to be proved wrong. Let them give us whatever charge they have filed with, at least, it should be attached with proof of evidence. Whatever they have, let’s look at it,” he said.
He then urged President Bola Tinubu to follow the rule of law to investigate and remove the director general of the DSS from office, as he had been known to carry out actions that sparked criticism, saying, “We are calling on the President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, you should not allow the overzealousness of the Director General of DSS to tarnish your hard-earned reputation of believing in the rule of law, of believing in opposition politics.”
Ozioma Samuel-Ugwuezi.
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