Professor Chijioke Uwasomba, a lecturer at Obafemi Awolowo University, has filed a complaint against Colonel Abubakar Alkali of the Special Investigation Bureau, Nigeria Army Military Police, alleging harassment and violations of his basic human rights.
As exemplary damages for “wrongful invitation” and the “threat to arrest him by the police personnel at the instance of Colonel Alkali for no legal justification,” Uwasomba, a lecturer in the Department of English, also asked for N10 million.
The FCT Commissioner of Police was identified as the second respondent in the lawsuit with the file number W/7744/23.
The plaintiff in the fundamental human rights enforcement lawsuit brought by his attorneys, Onyeisi Chimeke and Abdul Mahmud, said he received many invitations and arrest threats from the police as a result of the respondent breaking the terms of the agreement.
In addition, he demanded a declaration that the police’s and its agents’ decisions to invite him and then arrest him “based on the misleading information” that Alkali provided regarding a business deal (or agency relationship) between them were improper, unlawful, and in violation of his fundamental liberties to personal liberty and freedom of movement as guaranteed by Sections 35, 41, and 44 of the Federal Republic of Nigeria’s 1999 constitution.
In response to the complaint of the first respondent, the OAU don requested that the court enjoin the respondents, their servants, agents, and/or privies, jointly or severally, as well as any law enforcement agency acting under their orders, from threatening, harassing, arresting, or detaining him and members of his family in violation of his rights to human dignity, personal liberty, freedom of movement, and the right to work guaranteed by Sections 34, 35, 37, and 41 of the Constitution.
In addition, Uwasomba asked the court to rule that the first and second respondents did not have the authority under Federal Republic of Nigeria law or under any other statute or legal document to intimidate, harass, arrest, or detain him in violation of his fundamental rights to human dignity, personal freedom, freedom of movement, and the right to employment, which are protected by Sections 35, 37, and 41 of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 Constitution.
However, there is no set time for the case’s hearing.