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This is not justice! NBA cries out against impossible bail conditions
Imposing difficult and mostly impossible bail conditions, especially those requiring senior civil servants, cannot qualify for dispensation of justice, was the response of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), to the practice, which it says is becoming frequent in judicial space in recent years.
Afam Osigwe, Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), President of the lawyer’s body in Nigeria who raised the issue warned that the trend was transforming bail into a tool for pre-trial detention.
The NBA boss, said courts and law enforcement agencies were increasingly imposing conditions that many defendants could not meet despite being granted bail, adding that the frequent insistence on sureties who are senior civil servants and demands for landed properties of high value had made it difficult for many accused persons to regain their freedom pending trial.
“The frequent insistence on sureties who are senior civil servants of specified grade levels, coupled with demands for landed properties of extraordinary value, has in many cases transformed bail from a mechanism for securing attendance at trial into a tool of pretrial detention.
“The consequence is that many persons who are constitutionally presumed innocent and have ostensibly been granted bail remain incarcerated because the conditions attached to their release are beyond their reach.”
Stressing that such imposition of stringent bail conditions undermined the constitutional right to personal liberty and weakens the presumption of innocence, he argued that that bails were intended to secure the attendance of an accused person in court and not to serve as a punishment before conviction.
He added: “It is neither a punishment nor a mechanism for imposing pre-trial incarceration by indirect means. The law is settled that bail conditions must be reasonable, practical, and capable of being fulfilled by the accused person.
“Conditions requiring sureties who are serving civil servants on specific salary grades, ownership of landed properties of extraordinary value, or other burdensome requirements effectively convert the grant of bail into a denial of bail.
“There is no evidence that civil servants are inherently more reliable as sureties than other law-abiding citizens. Such requirements unduly narrow the pool of eligible sureties and create artificial barriers to the enjoyment of a constitutional right.”
Advancing judicial authorities, he specifically cited position of the Court of Appeal in Dasuki v. Director-General, State Security Service & Ors, which criticised the practice of making serving public officers a mandatory category of sureties, adding that section 165(1) of the Administration of Criminal Justice Act (ACJA) 2015, also provides that while courts had discretion to grant bail, such conditions must not be excessive.
His words: “Courts must ensure that bail terms remain fair, proportionate and attainable. Courts must guard against imposing terms that render the grant of bail illusory or nugatory. Bail should not become a privilege reserved only for those with extraordinary means or connections but should remain a mechanism for securing attendance at trial while preserving the liberty of persons who have not been convicted of any offence.
The echoes of the drums rolled out to celebrate the rescue of the 44 teachers and students, kidnapped from some schools in Oyo State, after 56 days in the bush, would surely be disrupted abruptly, with the divergent echoes of a fresh abduction, this time coming from Kogi State.
Reports indicate that the gunmen, struck on Tuesday at the Government Secondary School, Odo-Ekina, in Dekina Local Government Area of the state, abducting four students, the school principal and a National Examinations Council (NECO) ad hoc staff member.
Authorities of the Kogi State Police Command, who immediately unleashed their operatives in hot pursuit of the abductors, said the attack occurred at about 5:25 p.m. while the students were writing their NECO examination.
Saliu Oyiza Afusat, an Assistant Superintendent of Police (ASP) and spokesman of the command, said a combined team of police personnel and other security agencies has launched a search-and-rescue operation following the incident.
Informing that one of the students was actually rescued immediately, she said efforts were ongoing to secure the release of the remaining victims and apprehend the attackers, adding that Naziru Bello Kankarofi, the state Commissioner of Police, alongside the Brigade Commander and the State Security Adviser to the Governor, Commodore Jerry Omodara (Rtd), were already on the way to the scene for an on-the-spot assessment.
Oil prices are expected to go down now with the announcement of Donald Trump, US President that he will no longer impose a 20 percent “safe passage” fee on ships passing through the Strait of Hormuz.
The POTUS, hinged his reversal of the decision on the intervention from some Gulf countries, who pleaded with him not to toe the line due to the massive economic impact the decision would make on the region.
Indeed, oil prices had shot up immediately Trump announced the new levy on Monday while declaring the US ‘the guardians of the Hormuz strait,’ a measure which he said was to pay for the cost of guarding the volatile area in order keep supply of oil flowing.
Reports said that Gulf allies of the US worked frantically to get Trump on the phone in time to talk him out of the idea altogether, while a flurry of appeals came from Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Qatar.
In response, the POTUS, posting on his Truth Social platform, wrote: “Based on highly productive conversations with Middle East leadership, I have decided to replace the 20% United States Reimbursement Fee with Trade and Investment Deals that the various Gulf States will be making into the United States.”
Trump, who said the investments would be “MASSIVE but, at the same time, extraordinarily good for them, and their future,” added that the deals would see factories, plants, and equipment pour into the US at “Historic levels.”
The Gulf nations have committed to invest trillions of dollars in the US, though it remains unclear how much of that they will actually spend over the next several years.
Meanwhile, the US continues to bomb Iran in what appears to be a resumption of active conflict between both countries, despite an ongoing roadmap to end the conflict.
Reports say operatives of the Osun State Police Command, and those of the Department of State Services (DSS) had tracking the trail of Adeniyi Adeyemi, controversial Director General of the Presidential Foreign Intervention Promotion Council (PFIPC), for weeks, before he was eventually pulled out of his hole on Tuesday.
However, the duo, were said to have pulled back after failing to track him through his mobile phones, which he had reportedly switched off for about two days, making it difficult to locate him, leaving the stage for the members of the Police Intelligence Response Team (PI-RT) led by Moses Lohor, a Chief Superintendent of Police (CSP).
Lohor, said to have previously served as the Commander of the Anti-Kidnapping Squad of Osun State, and reported to have been involved in high-profile security operations and controversies, after taken over fielded his men to pick up signals from their well-oiled signal networks.
Regarded by many Osun residents as one of the key security officers who contributed significantly to the peace and stability enjoyed in Ilesa and other parts of the state during his tenure, he was said to have relied on his contacts before his transfer out of the state, said to have raised concerns from the public about the security situation he would be leaving behind.
His exit from the state was said to be hinged on an incident in 2024, in which he allegedly shot one Iyanda Alowonle, then Chairman of Osun State Motor Transport System, in the stomach at the police station in the state prompting an order for his arrest by then Inspector General of Police (IGP).
His effort was said to have paid off when he successfully tracked down the controversial PFIPC, boss, who was seen on Tuesday evening, in a shot video on social media undergoing interrogation, and eventually handed him over to Ibrahim Gotan, Commissioner of Police in the state.
The PUNCH quoted one of the sources as saying: “The arrest (of Adeyemi) took place on Tuesday morning by the IRT squad, who immediately moved him to Abuja. After he was arrested, he was taken to Ibadan and from there to Abuja.”
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