News Release: The Chief Magistrate 1, Ibrahim Taiwo Road Magistrate Court Kaduna Must Be Investigated

We deem it necessary and expedient to once again address the issue of our members that are presently detained in the Kaduna convict Prison and awaiting trial. We decided to address the issue a second time based on the illegalities that have attended their detention and the unconstitutional and procedural breaches that have attended the cognizance by the Chief Magistrate 1, Ibrahim Taiwo Road Magistrate Court Kaduna, Awaal Umar.

1.  On the 17th day of December 2015 the Nigerian Police Force prepared a First Information Report In relation to some of our members in their custody. The first of the First Information Report KMD/188X/15 had a total of 34 suspects. The second of the First Information Report KMD/189X/15 had a total of 79 suspects. The third of the First Information Report KMD/190X/15 had a total of 90 suspects. The Fourth of the First Information Report KMD/191X/15 had a total of 10 suspects mostly those arrested in Kaduna on the 16^th day of December 2015. The fifth First Information Report KMD/204X/15 had a total of 49 suspects.

2.  The Nigerian Police Force did not take any of these suspects to the Chief Magistrate Court for cognizance/prosecution and the Chief Magistrate 1, Ibrahim Taiwo Road, Awaal  Umar did not demand to see any of suspects before he signed their remand warrant and they were taken to prison directly from the various police formations where they were detained. The Chief Magistrate knew what he did was illegal and unconstitutional

3.   It was on the basis of this procedural irregularity and illegality that prompted the same Chief Magistrate to sit inside the premises of the Kaduna Convict prison to regularize what is patently an illegal arraignment and detention of the suspects and this he thought he has done on the 10^th day of February 2016.

4.   That based on the irregular arraignment, the Chief Magistrate could not explain how four of our members found themselves inside the Kaduna Convict prison when their names were not in all the First information Reports.  These are Nasiru Umar, Auwal Abubakar, Ibrahim Abdulhamid and Zaharadden Abdulaziz. Rather than arrest this illegality, the Chief Magistrate ordered the Police to capture and add their names to any of the First Information Reports.

5.  We are also at a loss why the Chief Magistrate will adjourn a simple bail application argued before him to the 29^th of March 2016 on the basis of an illegal directive he claimed he received from the Judicial Commission of inquiry not to release any of the suspects on bail pending the conclusion of their sitting.

Our Position and Demands

1.  The Chief Judge of Kaduna State must investigate the deliberate procedural irregularity perpetrated by the Chief Magistrate 1 Ibrahim Taiwo Road Kaduna in taking cognizance of the offences and suspects he signed their detention warrant in December three months after he signed the said warrant committing them to prison custody.

2.   The Controller General of Prison must investigate how and when and in what circumstances four suspects arrested by the Police found themselves into the Kaduna Convict Prison when they were never arraigned before any Court of Law and there was no warrant for their remand.

3.  We believe that it is illegal, unconscionable and unconstitutional for the Chief Magistrate Ibrahim Taiwo Road Kaduna to advice the Police to go and add the names of four of our members illegally thrown into the Prison into the existing FIR when their names were never there in the first place. We therefore demand the unconditional release of Nasiru Umar, Auwal Abubakar, Ibrahim Abdulhamid and Zaharadden Abdulaziz.

4.  We demand that the Chief Judge of Kaduna State and the Kaduna Judicial Service Commission must investigate how and when the Chief Magistrate got a letter demanding that he should not deliver ruling on a bail application moved before him on the 14^th day of January 2016 only to adjourn ruling on same to the 29^th day of March 2016 on very flimsy and illegal excuses and directives.

5. We demand that our members must be given their due process rights. Our members are being remanded in prison custody without any charges being framed against them. It is unconstitutional and illegal to detain suspects while the police are going about fishing for evidence that is not there.

6.   We demand that our members should be released unconditionally if the Police have no evidence that they have infringed on the law.   

7.   We insist that our members are the victims in the unfolding events and those that are supposed to face trial are the ones pretending to be victims.

Signed:

Ibrahim Musa

President

Media Forum Islamic Movement

0805 078 6093