TEN DETAINEES are to appear before Justice Emeka Nwite of the Federal High Court, Abuja tomorrow, Wednesday, 11th September, 2024. They face a range of serious charges including conspiracy to commit treason, inciting to mutiny and levying war against the state.
The State alleged that the detainees conspired, organised and participated in the nationwide #EndBadGovernance/#EndHunger Protests of 1st to 10th August, 2024.
However, the police case is extremely weak, especially as the ten detainees hardly know each other, despite being accused of conspiracy. Five are based in Abuja, but the other five were brought from Kano for waving flags.
Obviously, the protests greatly upset the federal government. The police appear to have picked up a random group of people to be punished for the activities of hundreds of thousands of protesters.
Six of the detainees are Muslim and the other four are Christians. They range in age from 21 to 51 years. Five are in their twenties and two are in their fifties. Nine are men and one is a woman. It would be hard to find a more diverse group of people.
The only thing that appears to unite the five detainees from Abuja is that they were all members of a WhatsApp group that was only created on 27th July [2024]. They are not all admin members of the group and some of the admin have not been accused by the police. There were around 450 members of the WhatsApp group at its height with around 30 having left.
The backgrounds of the five detainees from Abuja are:
• Michael Adaramoye (28 years): Brought up in a Christian family; he attended Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile Ife. Michael is a writer and content creator by profession. He has committed his intellect and youthful energy to contributing to the building of a better society.
• Mosiu Sodiq (29 years): A young practicing Muslim; he was born and raised in Lagos. He is an OND holder from Kwara State Polytechnic, Ilorin. He is a graphics designer and printer based in Abuja where he has lived for more than half a decade.
• Adeyemi Abiodun Abayomi (34 years): A devoted Christian and family man with a three-year-old daughter; He was brought up in Kaduna and graduated from Ekiti State University (TUNEDIK) with a degree in Computer Science in 2016. He ran Iva Valley Books for the last year.
• Eleojo Opaluwa (50 years): A Christian from Kogi State; is married with four children. He is a graduate, he also has a master’s degree in criminology from the National Open University, Abuja. His first child is a university undergraduate and the other three are still in lower schools. He is a trade union organiser at the Nigerian Union of Electrical Employees (NUEE), FCT Chapter. He is also Vice Chairperson of NLC for Kogi State.
• Angel Love Innocent (51) is a Christian. She has 16-year-old son. She works in the real estate business in Abuja and has several other business interests.
The names and ages of the five detainees brought from Kano are:
Buhari Lawal (21 years); Bashir Bello (21 years); Suleiman Yakubu (28 years); Abdulsalam Zubairu (37 years); and Nuradeen Khamis (47 years).
Millions of Nigerians supported, and indeed participated in the nationwide #EndBadGovernance/#EndHunger protests.
Obviously, the protests greatly upset the federal government. The police appear to have picked up a random group of people to be punished for the activities of hundreds of thousands of protesters.
We can only hope that they will be given bail on Wednesday and found not guilty in the near future.
Comrade Katchy is the National Secretary, Committee for the Defence of Human Right CDHR
