TheCable

Abubakar Sidiq, a political blogger, has been arrested by the Economic Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) for a publication on his website.

Michael Bello, Sidiq’s lawyer, disclosed this  to TheCable on Monday but did not give the full reason for the arrest, only saying it was because of “an online publication”.

He said his client was arrested in the morning by six operatives of the EFCC.

“About 8:45am today, some gentlemen walked up to the door of Mr Abubakar Sidiq in Kubwa; they said they were there in respect of a car that someone said was missing. They said they traced the car to the house,” he said.

“They asked for the particulars of the vehicle, and he gave it to them. It was at the point of this discussion that the EFCC bus was driven in… One of the men identified himself as Mayana Sambo, a leader of the team from EFCC.

“They now made it obvious that the story of the missing car was a decoy to pull him out of the house. They opened up that he was under arrest in respect of one of his publications. They presented a warrant to search his house, and they searched his house until about 10am. They only left with some documents from the house.”

Attempts by TheCable to get the response of the EFCC were unsuccessful as Wilson Uwujaren, the anti-graft agency’s spokesman, said he was still trying to confirm the arrest.