Rubbles of demolished buildings at Okuama community.
The Nigerian Army may be about to face two suits separately filed by two leaders of the Okuama community in Bomadi LGA of Delta State, challenging their continuous detention.
Soldiers of the Nigerian Army, were on March 14, 17, killed while on a “peace-keeping mission” in the Okuama community.
Many parts of the community, were after the incident, destroyed as residents fled their homes.
The claimants, James Oghorokor and Dennis Okugbaye, were said to have been arrested alongside four others by the military between August 18 and 20 and have since been kept in unknown detentions.
The four others arrested, are Arthur Ekpekpo, Belvis Adogbo, Anthony Ahwemuria, and Rita Akata.
In the fundamental rights suits marked FHC/WR/CS/84/2024 and FHC/WR/CS/85/2024, filed separately before a Federal High Court in Warri, Delta State, the claimants are demanding N100 million each as damages for violation of their fundamental human rights.
The Nigerian Army and the Department of State Services (DSS) are the respondents in the suit.
The claimants, through their counsel, Malcolm Omirhobo and Akpokona Omafuaire, are challenging their arrest, detention without trial, and failure to give them access to their lawyers.
They are asking the court for a declaration that the invasion of their homes without due process of law was a flagrant violation of their fundamental rights to private life.
They are also praying the court to declare that the refusal to charge them to court since their arrest on August 19 and the failure to grant them access to their lawyers are also “violation of their rights to personal liberty and therefore illegal, unlawful, and unconstitutional”.
The applicants prayed the court for the “enforcement of their fundamental rights to their personal liberty, right to private and family life, right to the dignity of their human person, and right to freedom of movement against the respondents”.
They are asking the court to “compel the respondents to release them unconditionally, while seeking a perpetual injunction restraining the respondents, their servants, agents, and/or privies from further acts of violating their fundamental human rights”.
