Three indigenes of Enugu state have instituted a fundamental rights enforcement suit against the Nigerian Police over alleged breach of their rights following their unlawful detentions.
By the suit, the Plaintiffs, namely; Ofor Raphael, Hon. Hypolite Okafor and Ude Augustina, are demanding the sum of N100 million for their ill-treatment and another N10million in general damages.
The applicants are praying the court to order the Nigeria Police, Awgu Division, the Inspector General of Police and the Commissioner of Police to release them from illegal detention.
They want a declaration that the persistent threats to arrest and detention of the applicants indefinitely on personal vendetta by the 1st Respondent, the DPO of Awgu Police Station, over petitions previously written against him, by the applicants when the Applicants have not committed any offence known to the law, amount to a breach or is likely to breach the fundamental rights of the applicant as provided for in sections 35(1) and 41, of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended) and Articles 6, and 12(1) of the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights (Ratification and Enforcement) Act, Cap A9 Laws of the Federation of Nigeria, 2004, and are therefore unconstitutional, unlawful, illegal, wrongful and amount to flagrant abuse of the fundamental rights of the Applicant.
In the suit filed at the Enugu State High Court on January 27, 2025, lawyer to the three applicants, who are members of the Voice Awgu Egeleli Forum, said they were arrested in connection with the controversy over the DPO’s indiscriminate arrest and extortion of members of the community for bail.
The counsel said Mr Christopher Api and his wife were first arrested and detained on January 22, and Augustina, who went to give them food in the cell, was equally apprehended and detained.
Furthermore, it was alleged that the DPO ordered the arrest of Okafor, when he also visited the police station to press for the release of members of the community association.
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Therefore, they are pleading that unless the court issued an urgent order for their release, their lives may be in danger having been detained for more than one week.
