Marketer accuses police over frame-up charges

A petroleum marketer based in Minna, has over the weekend queried the continuous harassment and trump-up charges of attempted murder foisted on him by the Niger state police command.
The marketer, Murtala Musa, while appealing for the intervention and protection of the Inspector General of Police, Ibrahim Idris, claimed that the Police conspired with a government agency to demolish his properties in a construction site in Minna.

He said while addressing newsmen through his legal counsel, Barrister Musa Suleiman, that the state Commissioner of Police, Dibal Yakadi was being vindictive with the false charges of attempted murder and criminal intimidation brought against him in a Minna magistrate court.
However, in a reaction the Police Public Relations Officer, DSP Mohammed Abdullahi, told our correspondent in Minna that the marketer was suspected to have used his car to knock down a staff of the board after verbal threats soon after the demolition of his construction site for which he was charged.
This was however dismissed by the legal counsel insisting that his client was with the Police at the time of the incident.
Musa claimed that the charges were trumped up by the Police Commissioner after realising that police authorities and the Human Rights Commission have stepped up investigations into the petition he earlier filed against the Command over abuse of office and other professional misconduct by the police boss.

He said: “After the police demolished properties worth millions of naira belonging to my client on the site, they charged him to magistrate court 8 on 10th February 2018 on two count charges of contravention of residence order contrary to section 151 and obstructing public way or line of navigation contrary to section 194 of penal code.

“The court granted him bail only for the police to withdraw the first FIR and substituted it with another new charges of attempted culpable homicide and criminal intimidation on the 21st February 2018, days after my client petitioned the IGP, Human Rights Commission and others.”
While calling on the IGP for an independent investigation into the matter, the petroleum marketer blamed the Niger state police for destroying his properties without a valid court order.
He said that the vindictive action of the police became more pronounced especially when the Human Rights Commission has commenced investigations into the matter.
However, in a response, the police has dismissed the allegations explaining that the Commissioner of Police only tried to mediate and reconcile the parties involved in the case after the Niger state Urban Development Board lodged a complaint against the marketer for erecting property without permit from the board.