A hotelier and Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer of D&G Motor Dealer Enterprises Limited and D&G Hotel, Event, and Suites in Ijaiye Ojokoro, Lagos, Mr. Ayobami Moses Idowu, has filed a lawsuit demanding N100 million in damages from the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) over alleged invasion and destruction of his home and place of business.
This is contained in an application filed before the High Court of Lagos State in the Epe Judicial Division, dated March 6, 2024.
Joined in the suit are: the Chairman/Chief Executive of the NDLEA, Brigadier General Buba Marwa (Rtd) as the 1st Respondent; the Commander, NDLEA, Lagos Command as the 2nd Respondent; while the 3rd Respondent is ACN, Adekunle Oduola, NDLEA, Lagos Command.
In the application submitted on his behalf by his legal counsels including Chief M. Aliu, Hazzan Muhammed Esq, Hussein Muhammed, and Bodunrin Muhammed Esq of Complete Solicitors and Advocate, Ibeju-Lekki, Lagos, Mr. Idowu alleged endless invasion of his home and place of business, threat of arrest and detention, and laying of siege at the home and place of business by men of the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd respondents.
This invasion, which they said, was done on the behest of the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd respondents “without any legal justification is unlawful, illegal, barbaric, and unconstitutional and violates the applicant’s right of personal liberty, right to dignity of human person, right to freedom of movement and right to freedom of association, right to own movable and immovable property anywhere in Nigeria as enshrined under Sections 34, 35, 40 and 41 of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended) and Article 4, 5, 6, 7, 10, 11, and 12 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights (Ratification & Enforcement) Act, Cap 10, LFN 1990.
The counsels also requested a declaration that the imminent likelihood of further invasion of the applicant’s home and place of business and further arrest and detention of the applicant by a team led by the 3rd Respondent acting on the instruction of the 1st and 2nd Respondents without any legal justification is unlawful, illegal, barbaric, and unconstitutional and violated the Applicant’s right to personal liberty, right to dignity of human person, right to freedom of movement and right to freedom of association, right to own movable and immovable property anywhere in Nigeria as enshrined under Sections 34, 35, 40 and 41 of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended) and Article 4, 5, 6, 7, 10, 11, and 12 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights (Ratification & Enforcement) Act, Cap 10, LFN 1990.
It is stated that the molestation, harassment, humiliation, degrading, and inhuman treatment of the applicant, his wife, children, relatives, and staff members by the team led by the 3rd Respondent, acting under the instruction of the 1st and 2nd respondents, violate the rights of the applicant.
The lawyers also requested a declaration that the unlawful and illegal routine invasion, unlawful search, and ransacking of the Applicant’s home and place of business by men of the 1st and 2nd respondents led by the 3rd respondent, without any legitimate justification other than to extort the applicant (which indeed extorted the applicant of the sum of N1,000,000), is utterly barbaric, archaic, unspeakable, preposterous, and violates the applicant’s right to own both movable and immovable property anywhere in Nigeria as enshrined in Sections 43 and 44 of the 1999 Constitution (as amended).
Subsequently, they requested an order restraining all the Respondents, whether by themselves, their servants, agents, officers, privies, or any person acting through or on their instruction, from unlawfully invading and ransacking, arresting and detaining, or subjecting the applicant to any form of humiliation, molestation, harassment, or laying siege at the home and place of business of the applicant, as it constitutes infringement on the fundamental rights of the Applicant as provided under the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended).
It is further stated that there should be a declaration that the forceful breakage of the lock of the applicant’s house at No. 8 Yusuf Street, Ijaiye Ojokoro, Lagos State at night, without a search warrant and when the respondents knew or ought to have known that the applicant and his family were not around for search, is not only illegal, unlawful, barbaric, and archaic but also unconstitutional, null, void, and violates the applicant’s right to privacy as enshrined in Section 37 of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended).
Lastly, the application demands an award of the sum of N100,000,000 (One Hundred Million Naira) and a public apology in two national newspapers for putting the applicant through psychological, mental, and emotional trauma due to the invasion and ransacking of the Applicant’s home and place of business, threat of arrest and detention, humiliation, molestation, degrading, and inhuman treatment by men of the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd respondents acting through the 3rd respondent.
