Published 31st Aug, 2024

By Opeyemi Lawal

Abdullahi Haruna Kiyawa, the spokesperson of the Kano State Police Command, told FIJ on Saturday that the state government used a court to arrest radio journalist Muktar Dahiru, and that he had no clue about the case.

According to Kiyawa, the state government went to a court and it was still trying to transfer Dahiru’s case to the Kano Police at press time. Reports show that Dahiru, a broadcast journalist with Pyramid FM, has been in detention since Thursday for posting content the state government found offensive.

“Even though I have only seen the case in the media, I am supposed to find out. I am hearing a lot of things, but I have to confirm them. I heard that the state government complained through the court and he was arrested by the court, but they are trying to transfer the case to the police,” Kiyawa told FIJ on Saturday.

“I am yet to get the main gist. I have even asked officers in the State Criminal Investigation Department (SCID), but I will need time to get back to you.”

Magistrate Ummah Kurawa ordered Dahiru to be remanded at a correctional facility in Kano on Thursday after he was arrested for sharing several media contents critical of the state government on his Facebook page.

According to Premium Times, the broadcast journalist was secretly charged before Magistrate Court 24 at Gyadi Gyadi, Court Road, with criminal conspiracy, defamation of character, and intentional insult. The government said the alleged offences contravene Sections 97, 391 and 115 of the Penal Code Law.

Among the content Dahiru had shared was one where, Anas Abba-Dala, the political adviser to Abba Yusuf, the governor of the state, said Kashim Shettima, Nigeria’s vice president, was not Nigerian. Abba-Dala also accused Shettima’s relative of murdering Ja’afar Adam, an Islamic cleric, at a mosque in Kano in 2007.

In another post he shared, an interviewee, an opposition politician, had accused Abba Yusuf, Kano governor, of corruption and requested that he allow federal anti-corruption agencies to investigate the multi-billion drug scandal in the state.

Another post Dahiru shared was an audio programme where someone had accused Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, the reinstated Emir of Kano, of being pretentious by living an expensive life like a woman but showing false sympathy to the poor.

Dahiru’s bail application is expected to be heard before the court on Tuesday.

The broadcast journalist’s arrest and remand comes less than a week after the Department of State Services (DSS) arrested Adejuwon Soyinka, the West Africa editor of The Conversation Africa, at an airport in Lagos.

Soyinka was arrested after some unnamed agency placed him on a watchlist. However, the DSS released him after six hours and kept his passport instead.

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