Lawyers to the leader of the outlawed Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), Nnamdi Kanu, were reportedly humiliated by operatives of the Department of State Services (DSS).
Kanu’s lead counsel, Ifeanyi Ejiofor, revealed that they were disgraced during a routine visit to the IPOB leader on Thursday.
He accused the secret police of forcing the IPOB leader’s lawyers to remove their shoes, glasses.
According to Ejiofor, they were offered slippers after being searched like ‘hardened offenders.’
Ejiofor said, “The routine visit to our client, Nnamdi Kanu, was conducted today, and it went successfully.
“Our client, Nnamdi Kanu, specifically requested for his kind regards and compliments to be conveyed to millions of his teeming supporters and well-wishers. He is deeply appreciative of your unwavering solidarity/support. He didn’t hesitate in requesting that you all continue to pray without season, because it is positively impacting.
“However, today’s visit witnessed a fundamental change in the hitherto procedures conventionally adopted for conducting the visit.
“We were initially unperturbed by the method now introduced by the DSS, but we feel compelled in the prevailing circumstance to make public our strange experience which borders on the improper treatment of lawyers in the course of conducting a court-ordered visit to their client who is undergoing trial.
“Lawyers on this visit were searched in a manner akin to a situation where hardened criminals are being searched for possible incriminating substance and object.
“They were traumatised not only because they were inhumanly treated as criminals on investigation, but the lawyers were further dehumanised after this embarrassing and unwarranted frisking, by being allowed to wear only slippers, after being divested of their shoes, reading glasses and writing materials, to visit their client.”
The lawyer stated that the IPOB leader however urged his supporters to remain focused, peaceful and law-abiding.
“We cannot be subjected to any form of intimidation/harassment during subsequent visits to Our Client, because the alien style is only targeted at imputing fear in us, which action we shall resist within the confines of extant laws.
“We shall get this infraction addressed by the Court in the fullness of time, as processes incidental thereto has been promptly initiated.”