#EndBadGovernance protesters absolve DSS of torture in detention

Some of the released EndBadGovernance protesters arrested during the August 2024 nationwide protest in Kaduna who have spoken out have declared that their sponsor, Khalid, was never tortured while in the custody of the Department of State Security (DSS) in the state.

Narrating their accounts after their release, the now-freed protesters insisted that they were treated fairly during their stay in detention.

According to one of the released protesters, Dahiru Hamza, who hails from Tudun Wada, Kaduna, their release followed the new DSS Director General’s decision.

His words: “Honestly, I was not happy with the person that sponsored us to the protest, Khalid, because he convinced us to believe that he had police authorisation to embark on the protest, only for us to end up in DSS custody.

“But we were lucky; since our arrest, we were never tortured or maltreated. I sometimes challenged our sponsor, who was with us in the same room for days. None of us were tortured in that room, and I never saw him being tortured either,” he said.

Dahiru, who narrated how he became scared after his arrest, thinking he would be maltreated, added that such never happened; even as he stated after writing his statement, he was provided with food to eat before his detention, and the medical team attended to them

However, he said the only problem they faced was being confined to a place because they were not used to being kept in one place for a long time as a DJ. Apart from that, nobody beat or maltreated them.

“You know it was not easy to stay in a place for days or more than a month without knowing your fate, even if you are well fed. That, I will say, was the problem, but nobody beat us in detention. If I had been tortured, now that I’m free from detention, I would not be afraid to say I was tortured, but I was not. I don’t know why Khalid claimed he was tortured in detention,” he said.

Similarly, another released protester, Abdullahi Isa, arrested on August 2nd, said nobody touched him in the name of beating in detention.

“We were in the room with Khalid, and I can tell you for a fact that nobody touched me or beat anybody among us. I never saw him beaten or tortured.”

He said they were not expecting to be released until they were called upon, that the new DGSS said their guardians were invited to write a statement on their behalf, and they were allowed to go after that.

“Abdullahi concluded that since their release from the DSS on the order of the new DGSS, none of the officers of the organisation had called or harassed them. We later heard that the new DGSS even told the Kaduna DSS to review all operations and legal procedures of their cases and that of Khalid in court, and that is why he is a free man today even though he sponsored us.”

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