Plateau High Court dismisses Mailafia application seeking to stop invitation

The suit filed by the former deputy governor of Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN), Dr Obadiah Mailafia at the Plateau State High Court to restrain the Nigeria Police from investigating him suffered a set back on Tuesday as the court dismissed his application saying the Police has the constitutional right to investigate him.

Dr Mailafia had approached the court on the premise that Nigerian Police has no right to invite him for interrogations on the same subject that the Department of State Services had earlier invited him.

It would be recalled that the former deputy governor of CBN was initially interrogated twice by the DSS over his outburst on the insecurity in the Northern part of the country and Nigeria as a whole.

Plateau State High Court 5 presided over by Justice Arum Ashom in Tuesday ruled that although the DSS has the right to invite Mailafia over the matter touching on internal security, the police also has the right to invite him for questioning as well on the same subject matters.

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Justice Ashom held that the double invitation by both the DSS and the police on the same issue did not amount to double jeopardy as moved by the applicant’s Counsel.

But the Counsel to Mailafia Mr Yakubu Bawa who is also the Plateau State Chairman of Nigeria Bar Association said the ruling was apt but that he had to brief his client before knowing the next line of action whether to appeal the ruling or not.

The applicant Counsel Bawa had argued that the invitation of his client by the police after he had honoured the invitation of the DSS  was illegal, unlawful, unconstitutional and ultra-vires his fundamental right which amounts to duplication of security details on the same related issues.

Bawa had also urged that even the invitation by the DSS, Plateau State Police Command was a violation of the applicant’s right and freedom of speech as he was commenting on the National issue having been an indigene of Southern Kaduna where there was killings, genocide and banditry.

According to the Counsel, his client merely granted an interview to a local FM station in Lagos which he said ran viral as he only expressed his opinion adding that after Mailafia went to honour DSS invitation and that as the lawyers were discussing the issue a letter came that he should appear before the police force headquarters in Abuja to clear some issues pertaining to the interview he granted.

However, Counsel to the respondent, Mr Lukman Fagbemi had earlier told the Court that the invitation by the police after the DSS invitation on the same issues did not amount to duplication of efforts as the two security organs are working at the same and one goal.

NIGERIAN TRIBUNE