Mr. Kayode Oyin-Zubair, an Ilorin resident and critic of the Senate President, Mr. Bukola Saraki, has received threats to his life from supporters of the Senate President.
Thugs of the Senate President also tortured another critic into falsely accusing him of attempting to detonate a bomb at the Kwara State High Court premises.
Fearing for his life, Mr. Oyin-Zubair has written to the Kwara State Commissioner of Police, alleging criminal defamation and threat to life. Dated August 31, the petition traced the Mr. Oyin-Zubair’s ordeal to about a month ago when he appeared at the Kwara State High Court in support of Mr. Biodun Baba, a teacher arraigned for criticising Mr. Saraki on Facebook.
On that day, he met a man who also came to solidarize with Mr. Saraki’s victim. On August 30, Mr. Oyin-Zubair returned to the Kwara State High Court to observe the proceedings in the matter between SaharaReporters and Mr. Saraki. Mr. Oyin-Zubair said he saw a swarm of people led by one Mr. Tunji Sulyman and one Mrs. Sarah Adebayo.
While waiting beside his car, Mr. Oyin-Zubair said he was greeted by a young man wearing a T-shirt emblazoned with “The Cabal Must Go”. He recognized the young man from their meeting during Mr. Baba’s court appearance the previous month. Mr. Oyin-Zubair said he had to leave the court premises to attend to a personal intervention program he had lined up in Ilorin that day.
Half an hour after he left, Mr. Oyin-Zubair said in the petition, he started receiving distress calls and messages from the young man he met, saying some individuals had planned to attack him court. Mr. Oyin-Zubair said he advised the young man to remain in the courtroom because nobody would dare attack him inside the courtroom.
When Mr. Oyin-Zubair finished what he was doing, he headed to the court, where he got some policemen to accompany him to the courtroom in the hope of rescuing the young man. However, they did not find him.
Later in the day, said Mr. Oyin-Zubair, the young man phoned to say he was abducted from the courtroom and brutalized. Much later the same day, Mr. Oyin-Zubair said he received calls from friends that a video had been posted on the Facebook page of one Mr. Olusegun Olusola AKA Shollyment.
The video, according to Mr. Oyin-Zubair, showed the young man he met in court lying against him after being tortured. He said he phoned the young man to find out what had happened and the young man said he was made to frame him up under duress, at gunpoint, as one of those engaged to disrupt court proceedings earlier in the day. The next day, Mr. Oyin-Zubair said a blog owned by Mr Saraki, Fidelity Reporters, posted a report that Mr. Oyin-Zubair was sponsored by SaharaReporters publisher, Mr. Omoyele Sowore, to detonate a bomb at the court premises.
“It is on this note that I passionately request you to investigate those behind this dastardly act and threat to my life before harm is done to me. To aid the fast investigation, the cellphone number of Olusegun Olusola, who posted the video on his Facebook page is 08036619476,” Mr. Oyin-Zubair wrote in his petition.
