An independent panel of inquiry probing allegations of brutality and other rights violations by operatives of the defunct Special Anti-Robbery Squad (SARS) on Tuesday ordered the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) to produce the suspended Head of Police Intelligence Response Team, Abba Kyari, unfailingly on March 30.
This followed a petition filed by three persons challenging the unlawful arrest of their relatives.
The panel was put together by the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC).
The petitioners – Ambrose Mairungu, and Blessing Dung – had in a petition marked 2020/IIP-SARS/ABJ/205 alleged that Yakubu Danjuma, Ibrahim Daniel and Choji, who is Dung’s husband, were unlawfully arrested, detained, tortured and received inhuman treatment from Kyari.
The panel on March 11 ordered the Chairman of NDLEA, Brig.-Gen. Buba Marwa (retd), to produce the police officer on March 22 to defend himself on the allegations.
Kyari is currently detained by the agency for alleged link with an international drug cartel.
However, in response to the order, the police officer’s counsel, Abdullahi Haruna (SAN), sent an administrative letter was written to the chairman of the panel, Suleiman Galadima.
He requested that all petitions where Kyari’s name was mentioned be made available to him and promised to respond appropriately to the claims after two months.
A member of the panel, Mr. Garba Tetengi (SAN), who presided over the sitting in the absence of the chairman, rejected the request.
He adjourned the matter till March 30.
In the petition, Dung told the panel that her husband received a phone call from his friend, Danjuma, for a meeting outside the house on December 17, 2019.
She said: “I followed my husband outside and I sighted two tinted-glass vehicles with IRT written on them.
“I saw armed police officers who came out from the vehicles, cuffed my husband, shot in the air and drove off with him.”
She urged the panel to award N10 million compensation to the family.
