House Summons AGF, DIA, UNCR, Others over Abduction of Cameroonian Professors Working in Nigerian Varsities
The House of Representatives Committee on Public Petition has summoned the Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Lateef Fagbemi (SAN), and the leadership of the Defence Intelligence Agency (DIA) to appear before it on Tuesday, May 14.
Also summoned were the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in Nigeria and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
They are expected to give further information on the abduction of some Cameroonian professors teaching in some Nigerian universities, who were abducted in 2018 and jailed in their country
A lawyer and former member of the House of Representatives, Abdul Shaibu Oroh, confirmed the development to THISDAY yesterday in Abuja.
He said the petition on the matter was presented to the House by a legal firm, Frulaw Chambers. He said the petitioners were urging President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and the House of Representatives to work for the release of the professors.
The professors, who had lived and worked in Nigeria for a long time, were abducted from their homes by Cameroonian security men working in collaboration with their Nigerian counterparts and extradited to Cameroon.
The 10 university teachers as well as a retired Deputy Registrar with the Ahmadu Bello University (ABU) in Zaria and a former Vice President (Deputy Vice-Chancellor) of America University of Nigeria in Yola sought a diplomatic intervention for their freedom in a petition to the House of Representatives and the Presidency, through their lawyers.
In the petition submitted to the House Committee on Public Petition, the university teachers urged the parliament to liaise with the president to deploy other means to secure their release from detention in Cameroon.
They claimed, in the petition presented to the House by a legal firm, Frulaw Chambers, that they were abducted from Nera Hotel in Abuja on January 5, 2018, by security agents.
The petitioners claimed that they were repatriated to Cameroon, tried by a military tribunal, and sentenced to life imprisonment at the Kondengui Maximum Security detention facility.
They begged the Federal Government of Nigeria to ensure the implementation of Communication 59/2022 of October 14, 2022, of the UN-HRC-WGAD to facilitate their release.
They said the Federal Government of Nigeria needed to take action and implement the rulings in the three judgments of the
Federal High Court of Abuja in 2019 which ordered the release and compensation of these petitioners.
They urged “the Nigeria Government to leverage the Abuja 2002 ruling in suit number FHC/ ABJ/CS/30/2002 between The Southern Cameroons Rep by Kelvin Ngwang Ngumne et al Vs the Attorney General Federal Republic of Nigeria, and intervenes to resolve the conflict between Southern Cameroons and La Republique du Cameroun”.