THE State Security Service (SSS) has released the former chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Abdulrasheed Bawa, four months after detaining him.
The SSS confirmed Bawa’s release in a statement signed by Director Public Relations and Strategic Communications Peter Afunanya on its X account late Wednesday, October 25.
Recall that Bawa was arrested and detained by the SSS soon after he was suspended as the EFCC chairman by President Bola Tinubu.
The ICIR, in a report, spoke to some lawyers who criticised his continued detention without charges, describing it as illegal and a violation of his fundamental human rights.
The SSS, in June, invited Bawa over weighty allegations against him shortly after Tinubu suspended him.
The organisation kept him in custody until his release on Friday. He spent 134 days with the SSS.
Bawa was denied access to lawyers and family members for over a month after his detention by the secret Service.
A source close to him told our reporter that Bawa was not told the specific offence he committed, but there were speculations that the primary reason why he was removed and detained was due to the role he played in the attempt to scuttle the emergence of Tinubu as the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the February 25 presidential poll.
Former President Muhammadu Buhari appointed Bawa in February 2021, making him the fifth substantive chairman of the Commission.
On October 12, Tinubu appointed Ola Olukoyede as the Bawa’s successor.
He is the first head of the EFCC from Nigeria’s South since its creation 20 years ago.
The ICIR reports that none of the previous five substantive Chairmen of the Commission finished his or her tenure. They were all sacked.
The Commission’s pioneer Chairman is the incumbent National Security Adviser, Nuhu Ribadu.
A reporter with the ICIR
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