Police, SSS helped Chime lock up wife – Falana

A human rights lawyer, Mr. Femi Falana, has identified officials of the Nigeria Police Force and the Department of State Security Service as also culpable in the alleged detention of the wife of the Enugu State Governor, Clara Chime, for four months.

Falana made the allegation at the public presentation of a book titled ‘Honour for sale’ by Major Debo Bashorun, in Lagos, on Friday.

He said, “I have discovered that the police and SSS helped the governor in confining his wife in a room for four months incommunicado.”

The news of the alleged illegal detention of  the wife of the Governor broke earlier this month with Falana subsequently saying Clara had requested his intervention in the matter.

However, following Falana’s open declaration, Governor Sullivan Chime held a press conference in company of Clara’s relatives and a doctor said to be treating her, denying the allegation. Chime claimed he had only kept Clara indoors due to her ill health.

At the event, Falana, however, condemned the presence of security operatives at Chime’s press conference, describing the connivance of the police with the ruling class as a threat to democracy and rule of law..

He said, “The police officers were also at the press conference when the governor admitted that he has turned the government house into a psychiatric ward.”

Prominent lawyer and Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Prof. Itse Sagay, the widow of late Gani Fawehinmi, Ganiat, and anti-corruption crusader, Debo Adeniran, among  others, have described the  new book as an insightful attempt to unravel the mystery surrounding the murder of the late publisher of Newswatch Magazine, Dele Giwa, via a parcel bomb.

Sagay, who chaired the event, noted that the author had provided additional insight into the killing of Giwa in terms of the circumstances and the dramatis personae.

“Since the saga of late Chief Gani Fawehinmi’s prosecution of this matter, two times from the High Court to the Supreme Court, we have not had such a detailed examination of what happened. He did a legal analysis of the incident and then, prepared the necessary information for prosecution. We still have all those details.

“But this is the latest insight into the murder of Dele Giwa. It is not only informative, but shows that though anyone who commits a heinous crime of this sort may get away with it, in terms of not being physically punished, his reputation will forever be soiled and what history will make of him will be very damaging,” he said.

Describing the role of the judiciary at the time Giwa’s death occurred, Sagay said there was evidence that its power to act on the matter was definitely curtailed by then Federal Military Government.

“The Supreme Court said late Fawehinmi had a right to bring a private prosecution, since everybody is everybody else’s keeper in Nigeria, unlike other parts of the world. Immediately he did that, a second round of challenges was started. A new set of judges were appointed to the Supreme Court.

“By the time Fawehinmi returned to the Supreme Court, the new set of judges had reversed what the court had done, which was totally illegal. But, since the action was being backed by the physical power of a military government, there was nothing anyone could do,” he said.