Drama in Court as sowore ‘s Passport Finally Released After Prolonged Seizure

I returned to court following Justice Musa Liman’s decision, which had earlier struck out the cybercrime case brought against me by the illegally appointed and now removed former IGP, Kayode Egbetokun.

Rather than accept that ruling, Egbetokun, working through loyalists, orchestrated a fresh legal maneuver. Alongside ACP Bukola Kuti and the AIG Emmanuel Ade Aina, Director of Legal Services, Nigeria Police Force in charge of the Police Legal Directorate, a bizarre ex parte motion was filed to relist the same case for a fresh trial.

It is astonishing that even after his removal from office, Egbetokun appears to continue exerting influence within the police hierarchy.

My legal team, led by Barrister Marshal D F Abubakar and Barrister Rosemary Hamza of Adeyanju Deji’s chambers, immediately applied for the certified ruling and final order striking out the case. However, court officials stalled the process, citing public holiday.

Our focus was to retrieve my international passport and land documentation for my surety, which Justice Liman had seized as part of bail conditions since January 2025. Despite repeated applications, the judge refused to release it, at one point even suggesting that my wife and family must swear affidavits before it could be returned.

The case itself suffered repeated deliberate adjournments, often justified by Justice Liman’s reasons such as conferences and other engagements.

Recent developments now cast those delays in a different light.

Last week, the AIG in charge of Legal, Mr. Aina, filed an unusual ex parte motion to relist the struck-out case. Today, the court registrar informed us that Justice Liman would not sign the ruling and order formally striking out the case until the police appeared to move their motion to relist the case as well withdraw in open court.

Even more strangely, the police filed yet another ex parte application to withdraw their earlier motion to relist the case.

While we waited for proceedings to begin, we were suddenly informed that the case was not listed for hearing; even then we insisted that the request to relist should never have any impact on our request to get the ruling and order..

During this period, I addressed journalists at the court premises on a range of national issues. In the course of that interaction, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Musbau, SAN, abruptly interrupted and attempted to bully both myself and members of the press to vacate the courtroom area. He clearly did not anticipate what followed.

We left the courtroom and proceeded to another engagement with the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC Nigeria) in the FCT. Upon concluding that meeting, my attorneys informed me that Justice Liman had relisted the matter, allowed a police lawyer to move their application, and, ironically, brought the entire case to an end through an ex parte order permitting the police to withdraw it.