On police arrest of Oba Akewi, family members

The Nigeria Police Force (NPF), a couple of days ago, dragged a 43-year old freelance broadcaster, Mr Rotimi Jolayemi, before a Federal high court sitting in Abuja for allegedly inciting public annoyance against the incumbent Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed.

Jolayemi, popularly known as “Oba Akewi”, is the Vice Chairman of Freelance and Independent Radio Broadcasters Association of Nigeria (FIBAN), Osun state chapter.

The police charged the broadcaster to court following complaints lodged against him by the minister.
Specifically, Lai Mohammed had accused Oba Akewi to have incited the public against him by recording an eight-minute audio, critical of him and released same via WhatsApp  Messenger, a cross-platform instant messaging application on April 14, 2020 at Osola compound, Ekan nka in Kwara State.

The said audio which aggrieved the minister was allegedly shared to a group WhatsApp chat platform known as “Ekan Sons and Daughters” for the purpose of causing annoyance, insult, hatred and ill will to the minister.
Members of the group WhatsApp chat platform also shared the audio which made it go viral instantly.
The angry minister consequently lodged a complaint to Kwara Police Command whose detectives went after Jolayemi but could not get him.

When the police could not get Oba Akewi, the detectives went after his wife, Mrs Dorcas Jolayemi, and two of his brothers, John and Joseph, as bait, on the purported order of the minister.
They were all locked up for eight, nine and two days respectively.

Following developments in the matter, Jolayemi surrendered himself to the police in Kwara State on May 6. He was quickly arrested and flown to Abuja where he was detained in a police cell. More than ten days after he was detained without trial, individuals and human rights organisations, including Committee for the Defence of Human Rights (CDHR), started mounting pressure on the police to either release Oba Akewi unconditionally or charge him to court if he had indeed committed any offence known to law.

According to FIBAN Chairman, Olu Olugbade, the minister had tagged Jolayemi’s audio as hate speech.
Olugbade said his organisation had made effort in appealing to the minister but its appeal fell on deaf ears.
He said, whereas, Jolayemi is a law-abiding citizen and would not set out to hurt the minister.
He however raised concerns over the health condition of the detained broadcaster. 

The minister and the police however kept sealed lips over the refusal to charge Jolayemi to court. But on May 22, 2020, the police filed a one-count charge against Oba Akewi after he had been detained in police cell for 16 days.
According to the one-count charge marked FHC/ABJ/CR/104/2020 against the journalist, the police said Oba Akewi sent an audio message through his android phone device to a group WhatsApp platform known as “Ekan Sons and Daughters” and which went viral immediately after it was posted for the purpose of causing annoyance, insult, hatred and ill will to the current Hon. Minister of Information and Culture.
The offence was said to be contrary to section 24(1)(b) of the Cybercrime (Prohibition, Prevention etc) Act 2015.

Full blown trial of the merit of the case would soon commence in court.
In a democracy, anybody who feels his rights have been impugned like the Honourable Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, is at liberty to move against his aggressors as was done by the minister in this case.
The police have also done well by quickly acting on the complaints of the minister to go after Jolaiyemi for his own side of the case to enable them decide if there is prima facie case against him.

However, the arrest and detention of Oba Akewi’s wife and his two brothers as purported bait when the police could not lay their hands on the broadcaster amounted to hostage taking and breach of the 1999 constitution on the one hand and the Administration of Criminal Justice Act (2015) on the other hand.

We therefore strongly condemn the arrest and detention of the family members of Oba Akewi by the police for the sole reason that it contravened section 7 of the Administration of Criminal Justice Act (2015), which forbids hostage taking and the arrest of any person in place of another.

It is also worrisome that even after Oba Akewi surrendered himself to the police headquarters at Ilorin, Kwara state on May 6, 2020, he was held for more than two weeks in police cell, a duration much longer than what the organic law of the land allows.

Without prejudice to the matter in court, we strongly advise the police or anybody remotely connected to the action meted out on Oba Akewi and his family to exercise more caution in similar cases in future.