Alleged Increasing Police Harassment: Abuja Lawyers Cry to IGP, AGF

Alex Enumah in Abuja

Lawyers in Abuja have cried out to the Inspector-General of Police, IGP, as well as the Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Prince Lateef Fagbemi, SAN, to intervene and end what they claim is police’s unlawful activities against legal practitioners in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) and by extension the country in general.

Lawyers under the aegis of Lawyers of Conscience, who made the appeal, Wednesday, while sharing their plight with journalists in Abuja, specifically condemned the alleged harassment of one of their members and human rights activist, Mr. Victor Giwa, by police in Abuja.

Coordinator of the group, Barrister Maxwell Opara, while speaking with journalists, threatened to sue the IGP in his personal capacity as Kayode Egbetokun, if he fails to act accordingly.

Narrating how the issue started, Opara said a staff of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited, Mrs. Asabe Waziri, who bought a multi-million-naira property in the Maitama District of Abuja, led to series of litigations.

According to the lawyer, Waziri was alleged to be instigating the police to carry out unlawful acts in respect of cases pending before courts of competent jurisdictions.

The purchase of the multi-million-naira property by Waziri was said to have attracted several court cases before the FCT High Court, during which an order was issued for her eviction due to her alleged faceoff with other property owners in the apartment as well as financial infraction in the purchase transaction.

Upon the order of the court, Waziri was evicted from the property, but was however, said to be bitter with the eviction carried out by bailiffs of the Abuja High Court.

Although, she was said to have challenged her eviction in court, and the suit still pending, Opara accused Mrs. Waziri of resorting to self-help with the unlawful use of police to achieve what she could not achieve in the open court.

Opara specifically said the police have no business dabbling into a purely civil transaction of property purchase.

The lawyer added that the police as a law-abiding institution should allow the matter to be fully determined by the court instead of acting as a court of its own.

He insisted it was wrong of Mrs. Waziri to use the police to harass Victor Giwa, who is counsel to the property developer, Abbey Signatures Ltd.

Opara warned the IGP and his officers to stop taking laws into their hands with unlawful and illegal support to Waziri to intimidate and harass Victor Giwa.