Taraba Reps member, Usman cries out over incarceration of supporters

The member representing Wukari/Ibi federal constituency, Danjuma Shiddi Usman has again frowned at the continued detention of his Campaign Director-General, Samaila Yakubu.

Shiddi called on the Taraba State governor, Arc. Darius Dickson Ishaku, as a matter of urgency, to drop his plans to gag the press.

The lawmaker, who is the Senatorial Candidate for Taraba South in the forthcoming general election, said rather than holding his campaign DG and some of his supporters incommunicado, they should be arraigned before the court.

He said the “should be allowed to take its course on the issue because Samaila Yakubu and three other APC supporters have been in prison more than four months without trial”.

Wondering why the State command of the police allowed itself to be a tool used by the State government to harass and intimidate opposition parties, he beckoned to the government to ensure that justice is done on the people “they have unlawfully incarcerated.”

The lawmaker, who also alleged that there are ongoing plans by the State government to forward to the State House of Assembly a bill that would gag the press, said he will walk tirelessly round the clock to frustrate the bill from seeing the light of the day.

DG and some supporters of the lawmaker are being detained in Gassol Local Government Correctional Centre for alleged offences ranging from public disturbances to incitement.

However, the State government called on the public to desist from mixing politics with such arrest.

The government, through the commissioner for Information and Reorientation, Louis Emmanuel, alleged that the DG was nabbed following his involvement in “thuggery activities.”

According to the commissioner “Samaila Yakubu was arrested in Takum by the Police because he constituted himself into an out-law, causing pains on the daily existence of the people of Takum and environs”.

As of the time of filing this report, the DG in question, Yakubu has been rushed to the Federal Medical Centre (FMC) Jalingo, as he was alleged to have fallen sick in the correctional centre.