UNILORIN Lecturer Says Fear For His Life Forced Him To Retract WhatsApp Post

By Sabiu Abdullahi

A University of Ilorin lecturer, Chief Elijah Olorunsuwa, has alleged that he feared for his life while in police custody after officers arrested him over a WhatsApp post about a road project in Kogi State.

Olorunsuwa, who teaches in the Department of Political Science, said he signed a retraction of the post under pressure because he feared remaining in custody after learning about the deaths of miners in a Civil Defence cell in Minna.

In an interview with PUNCH, the lecturer recounted how 8 policemen arrived at his residence at about 5 am and said they had come to arrest him.

According to him, the officers initially claimed they would take him to the Kwara State Police Command, but later diverted towards Kogi State.

He said a female officer first knocked on his gate and asked to see his wife before telling them that her superior wanted to see him.

Olorunsuwa said one of the officers identified himself as a policeman from the Kogi State Command and informed him that he was under arrest. When he asked about the alleged offence, the officer reportedly told him that he would receive the explanation at the command.

The lecturer said he initially followed the officers in his car after they assured him that they were taking him to the police command. They stopped at an office in Eyenkorin, where nobody was present.

He said he insisted on seeing the arrest warrant and contacted his lawyer, who advised him not to proceed without seeing the document.

Olorunsuwa said the officers later persuaded him to join their vehicle after promising that the warrant would be shown to him at the state headquarters.

However, he alleged that they changed direction and headed towards Kogi State instead.

“I told them, “This is not what you said.” They said they had decided to take me to Kogi. At that point, I knew I had been taken away under false pretences. I felt I had been kidnapped.”

He said the uncertainty over his destination prompted him to contact close associates and ask them to publicise his arrest, which he attributed to Commander Jerry Omodara.

The lecturer eventually arrived in Lokoja, where he was served with a copy of the petition against him.

The petition, according to Olorunsuwa, concerned a WhatsApp message he posted on a community platform about the poor condition of the Kabba-Okehi-Oleluke road, which he said had remained in a deplorable state for more than 10 years.

He explained that he had shared information attributed to the managing director of a Federal Government agency, who allegedly told him that the World Bank had approved funding for the road project. He also said the information identified James Faleke as the person who facilitated the project, with the Kogi State Government expected to provide counterpart funding.

Olorunsuwa said Omodara, the Kogi State Governor’s Special Adviser on Security, subsequently asked him to remove the post and warned that he could face legal action if he refused.

The lecturer said he responded that Omodara could approach the court if he believed an offence had been committed.

He alleged that the petition accused him of cybercrime for sharing what it described as misleading information about the road project’s funding and asked the police to arrest and prosecute him.

Olorunsuwa said he was surprised by the complaint because he believed he had shared information from a source that had also appeared on blogs.

Although he eventually withdrew the post, the lecturer said the decision was not voluntary.

He alleged that police officers made the retraction a condition for his release on bail. He initially resisted but changed his mind after hearing reports about the deaths of miners in a Civil Defence cell in Minna.

The incident, he said, heightened his fears about his safety while detained outside his home state.

Olorunsuwa maintained that the retraction was obtained under duress and that he signed it because he wanted to leave custody.

He also described the arrest as traumatic for his family, particularly his wife, who first encountered the officers when they arrived at the residence before dawn.

The lecturer said the most troubling aspect of the incident was the alleged difference between what the officers told him about his destination and where they eventually took him.