Posted on: 08:22 Wed, 24 Jul 2019



The Special Adviser to the President on Media and Publicity, Mr Femi Adesina, says the Presidency has refused to obey Justice Gabriel Kolawole’s ruling, ordering the release of the leader of the Islamic Movement of Nigeria, Ibraheem El-Zakzakky, because it appealed the ruling.

Adesina said this during an interview on Channels Television’s Sunrise Daily on Tuesday.

The presidential spokesman said the then-Attorney General of the Federation, Abubakar Malami (SAN), could have his reasons for doing so since the government had the right to appeal the bail.

He said, “I know that the immediate past AGF in whose purview it was to make pronouncements on that, addressed the issue. If bail is granted and another case subsists, and there is an immediate filing of an appeal, you have to wait till it is dispensed with. So, that is a legal matter which is outside my purview, but as a layman, an unlearned man as lawyers would call us, we know that until all cases are dispensed with, you don’t say that they have been concluded.”

Adesina said the matter had since been taken before a court in Kaduna State and the bail hearing would come up on Monday.

He, therefore, called on the sect to wait for the court to make its ruling.
Responding to allegations that the police should not have fired live bullets at the group which was protesting against the continued detention of their leader in Abuja on Monday, the spokesman said the police deserved commendation, adding that the death toll would have been higher if the force did not demonstrate restraint.

Adesina said, “I tell you despite what happened yesterday (Monday), if the police had responded with greater force, you know we would not be talking about what we are talking now.

“A deputy commissioner of police was killed. Very sad, that is one life just like any other life.
He did not deserve to die in service.But if the police had responded in a similar fashion, you would have been talking of rivers of blood in Abuja now.”