After being taken hostage by the Inspector General of Police’s Intelligence Response Team, Daniel Ojukwu, a journalist with the Foundation for Investigative Journalism, was freed in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory, due to rallies organized by certain Civil Society Organizations.
Having being held captive by the police for ten days, Ojukwu was released on Friday.
This was made public by FIJ on its website on Friday.
On Wednesday, May 1, Ojukwu was reported missing; his phone was switched off, and his whereabouts were unknown to friends, family, and coworkers.
FIJ filed a missing person complaint at the local police stations where Ojukwu was heading 24 hours after he vanished.
Furthermore, the last known location of the journalist’s phones was traced by a hired detective for FIJ to an address in Isheri Olofin, which FIJ now believes is where the police originally picked him up.
After learning of Ojukwu’s arrest at Panti, his family was informed that the authorities were accusing him of breaking the 2015 Cybercrime Act.
He was moved to the Nigeria Police Force National Cybercrime Centre in Abuja on Sunday morning by the Inspector General of Police’s Intelligence Response Team.
Strict bail conditions were imposed by the police on FIJ’s attorneys and negotiators, who included Omoyele Sowore, editor of SaharaReporters, Jide Oyekunle, chairman of the Nigeria Union of Journalists’ FCT Correspondent’s Chapel, and Bukky Shonibare, chairman of the organization’s Board of Trustees.
To demand Ojukwu’s release, a group of journalists and civil society organizations stormed the Force Headquarters in Abuja on Thursday.
Among the demonstrators are a lawyer named Deji Adeyanju, a pro-democracy campaigner, and Sowore, the African Action Congress presidential candidate for the general elections in 2023.
Banners reading “Free Daniel Ojukwu,” “No to a police state,” “Journalism is not a crime,” and “Stop the impunity” were seen being carried by the demonstrators.
But after civil society organizations protested at Force Headquarters on Thursday, demanding his freedom, the police began to back down, and on Friday, he was finally freed.
“Daniel Ojukwu’s case is one of the most egregious cases of human rights violation and misuse of the powers of the Police against journalists,” said Abimbola Ojenike, Managing Partner of Slingstone LP, FIJ’s attorneys.
“This will not go unchallenged. There’s a significant public interest in Daniel’s human rights enforcement action that goes beyond just this violation. The constitutional right to free speech is dead if journalists can no longer expose the malfeasance in government officials without fear or oppression.”
