The Nigeria Police have been roundly criticized for tagging a 22-year-old girl, Gloria Okolie, ‘spy girl’ for the Eastern Security Network (ESN) after illegally detaining her for 70 days without charging her to court or allowing her family or lawyer access to her.
Nigeria Police had issued a press release on Sunday August 22, alleging that Ms Okolie worked with the ESN as a spy to perpetrate the series of violent attacks on police operatives and public institutions, including offices of the National Electoral Commission.
But reacting to the claim, the Executive Director, Rule of Law and Accountability Advocacy Centre, Okechukwu Nwanguma, in a statement on Sunday expressed shock at the police claim, describing it as a desperate attempt by the Force to salvage its already battered image.
Also responding to the same development, the Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) has accused the Police of attempting to frame Okolie for the crime.
Gloria Okolie, according to both HURIWA and Nwanguma, was reportedly arrested and had been kept in secret custody by the Intelligence Response Team (IRT) Tiger Base, Owerri, Imo State, for the past 70 days.
“Her parents did not know her whereabouts until one Izuchukwu Okeke who was also held in custody by the IRT for about six weeks and later released went to inform her parents that she was being detained at the IRT where she was turned into a slave.
“It was also revealed that the IRT operatives denied Gloria’s parents access to her when they came to see her and had continued to extort money from them on false promises to release her.
“They eventually transferred her to the Abuja office of the IRT after several visits by her parents and her lawyer who were denied access,” Nwanguma said.
HURIWA was even more forceful in its condemnation, saying that the claim by the police was mischievous, “utterly irresponsible, insensitive, irrational and projects the Nigerian Police Force as a bunch of hostage takers who do not care a hoot about morality or professional ethics of policing.”
In a statement signed by its National Coordinator, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko; and the National Media Affairs Director, Miss Zainab Yusuf, HURIWA also alleged that Ms Okolie had been illegally detained by the IRT “and made to work for the police in Imo State as a maid, an act that should constitute a criminal charge of forced enslavement and human trafficking; but here we are being told by the police that the victim of their human rights abuses is now a suspected spy for the so-called militants.”
The rights group asked the Inspector-General of Police not to carry through with “this shameful plot of vendetta and frame-up against an apparently distressed girl whose family hasn’t seen for months after she was made to disappear by the police in Imo State.”
HURIWA’s statement reads: “HURIWA recalled that Miss Okolie was said to have been arrested on June 17 by IRT officers in order to use her as bait to arrest her boyfriend who is suspected to be a member of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB).
“The family of the young lady had been searching for her.
“HURIWA recalled that Mr. Harrison Gwamnishu, an activist and director-general of Behind Bars Human Rights Foundation, in a Facebook post, said it was later discovered that Okolie was in the custody of IRT in Imo allegedly cooking and washing for the officers.
“Gwamnishu accused the police of extorting the family when they went to ask for her bail. He said Okolie was later transferred to Abuja.”
HURIWA condemned what it described as a clear case of human rights violation and abuse inflicted on a citizen of Nigeria on account of a mere suspicion that her purported boyfriend is a member of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), and that holding such a citizen as a hostage in exchange for someone being sought by the police is “absolutely unlawful, unconstitutional and outrageous.”
@@@@@@@Nwanguma noted: “It was not until someone released from the IRT custody revealed to Gloria’s parents that Gloria was in IRT custody and public attention drawn to the her unlawful detention and enslavement did the police now resort to the face saving stratagem of issuing a press releases purporting that Gloria is a ‘Militant’s Spy Girl’, a likely attempt to incriminate her and justify their illegal and unconstitutional actions.”
He asked: Assuming without conceding that Gloria is what the police now claim she is, why did they not contact her parents upon her arrest? Why did they not facilitate her access to legal representation which she is legally entitled to? Why was she not charged to court and evidence tendered to prosecute her?
“Why did the police re-arrest the young man who revealed to Gloria’s parents that she was in IRT custody? Where is the young man? Why were the police intent on keeping the young girl’s detention secret?”
He warned the police not to destroy the life and future of the young girl just “to save face.”
“But why should we believe the police this time? The same IRT claimed hours after the killing of Gulak that they had neutralised the suspects who killed him.
“Not a single of the alleged killers was arrested to enable police get useful information from the supposed gang about others who may be involved in the murder. Nothing more has been heard of that tragic murder till date.
“The police, especially in Imo State, have put themselves in a position where nobody believes anything they say. Even the media no longer trust the statements they issue about arrested persons,” he said.