Absence of Police, Military rep stall hearing of 8 petitions at Bayelsa Police brutality panel

 

Absence of Police, Military rep stall hearing of 8 petitions at Bayelsa Police brutality panel

  

ed for hearing on Wednesday by the Bayelsa State Judicial Panel of Inquiry on Police Brutality and Related Matters could not be heard following the absence of police and military representation.

 

 

Seven of the petitions were filed against the police while only one was against the Nigerian Army.

 

While the petitioners were present, the police and army who are the respondents, had no representative when the cases were called for hearing at the state Multi-Door Court Hall venue of the panel’s proceedings.

 

Chairman of the seven-member panel, Justice Young Ogola (retd), said the cases would not be heard since other parties were not present.

 

He, therefore, adjourned all the cases to January 7, 2021 for hearing, saying “the respondents might not have been served the papers to cause them to appear before the panel.”

 

Two of the petitioners, Pastor Orji Ogbonna and Mr Agorowei Godwin, who filed against the Warri Command of the Nigerian Army, did not hire lawyers.

 

They told the panel that they would speak for themselves but Ogola advised them to approach the Yenagoa and Sagbama branches of the Nigerian Bar Association who had declared to assist indigent petitioners with free legal services.

 

Another member of the panel, Fortune Godson Alfred, also informed Ogbonna and Agorowei that the Bayelsa Non-Governmental Organisations Forum (BANGOF) and the International Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA) were also available to help indigent petitioners prosecute their cases.

 

The Commissioner of Police in Bayelsa had at the inaugural sitting of the panel on Tuesday assured of the availability of the Police and its personnel that may be summoned adding that the Police would not shield anyone from the law.