How I was manhandled by Police, DSS, others - Sanusi

Sanusi Lamido Sanusi has opened up on how he was allegedly manhandled by security agents from the police, DSS and others in their effort to force him out the Emir palace and banish him to Nasarawa state after his dethronement by the Kano state government.

The former Governor of Central Bank of Nigeria who insisted that he wasn’t given a fair hearing before being dethroned in the lawsuit he filed on Thursday March 12 to challenge his detention and confinement in Awe, said that he was harassed and forced out of the palace without being allowed to pick up his personal belongings.

Sanusi accused the Kano State Commissioner of Police of putting out an order for him to be flown to Abuja without his family members in another aircraft.

The deposed Emir’s Chief of Staff, Da Buram Kano said in an affidavit attached to the lawsuit;

“I verily believe the state government purportedly removed the applicant from office as the Emir Kano on March 9, 2020 without any basis or justification whatsoever and was not given any hearing on any allegation on which his removal was predicated.

“The applicant is however, not challenging his removal as Emir of Kano in this suit.”

“Sanusi’s forcible relocation from the Palace of the Emir of Kano to Abuja, and later Nasarawa State, he has not been able to meet or unite with his wives, children, relatives and friends and that his rights have been severely curtailed.

“I know for a fact that the CP refused the applicant’s requests for protection and to carry his family with him to Lagos and stated that he had no such instructions from above, but instead directed that the applicant be flown to Abuja and then taken to Nasarawa State.

“In order not to jeopardise his safety or the safety of any member of his family or indeed other persons around, the applicant cooperated and proceeded in the vehicles provided by officers under the command of the respondents.

“They said the Commissioner of Police, along with other officers under the command of the respondents, harassed and rushed the applicant out of the Emir Palace, Kano, without letting him take any personal belongings and personal effects, along with him as they took him into their waiting vehicles.

“The applicant was then taken in company with loads of armed men, being officers under the command of the respondents, to the Nigerian, Air Force Base in Kano where he was put in a private aircraft to Abuja and departed Kano at about 6.40pm.

“The applicant was separated from his family who were also carried out of the palace.

“Upon arrival at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja, he was conveyed first to Lafia, then to Loko area of Nasarawa State, after being driven for about seven hours in the dead of the night.

“On March 10, 2020, he was taken back to Lafia and from there to Awe in Nasarawa State.

“That the applicant is personally being detained in Nasarawa State by agents of the first and second respondents (IG and DG of the DSS), purporting to carry out the orders of the third and fourth respondents (Muktar and Malami).

“Sanusi has not been alleged to be a threat to peace and security but rather cooperated with the officers under the command of the respondents, and has since his travails under the hand of the officers under the command of the respondents issued public statement of peace for order, for reconciliation, for cooperation with the new Emir and the avoidance of any security breach or conflict.”

Sanusi also asked the court to order the respondents to pay him N50m as damages for the unlawful and unconstitutional arrest and detention, and also publish an unreserved written apology in at least three national dailies for a breach of his fundamental human rights.

The dethroned monarch also sought for a restraining order against the respondents and their agents from banishing him from Kano or any other place of his choice, which according to him will be a violation of his fundamental right to reside in any part of Nigeria.

Recall that Justice Anwuili Chikere of the Federal High Court in Abuja ordered the immediate release of dethroned Emir of Kano, Sanusi Lamido Sanusi from confinement/detention in Awe community in Nasarawa state on Friday March 13. The case was subsequently adjourned to March 26 for further hearing.

The respondents to the application are, the Inspector-General of Police, Muhammed Adamu; the Director General of the Department of State Service, Yusuf Bichi; the Attorney-General of Kano State, Ibrahim Muktar, and the Attorney General of the Federation, Mr. Abubakar Malami, SAN.