The family of former Kaduna State Governor Mallam Nasir el-Rufai raised the alarm on Monday after Department of State Services (DSS) officers allegedly detained him following a court appearance at the Federal High Court in Abuja.
According to the family, the conduct was an obvious violation of current court orders requiring that he remain in the custody of the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC).
El-Rufai’s second wife, Hasiat, told media outside the DSS facility that the development had traumatized the family and that they lived under constant fear and surveillance.
“We now live in constant fear. Every day we get a threat—DSS is coming to raid your house, ICPC is coming to raid your house, or police are coming to raid your house. You are being followed. Our phones are tapped,” she said.
She explained that earlier in the day, El-Rufai appeared before Justice Joyce AbdulMalik of the Federal High Court, who granted bail and adjourned the case until 1pm.
During the break, she claimed he was momentarily transported to the DSS facility, a step he refused, citing two existing court orders from a Kaduna court directing that he be held at the ICPC.
“He said to them, I am not going to step down because there are two court orders that the Kaduna court gave that I should be remanded to the ICPC. Why are you bringing me here? He said, I am not furniture to be moved,” she recounted.
She stated that he was then returned to the ICPC, but that after the afternoon session, during which the prosecution requested an adjournment and the judge scheduled a resumption for the next day, he was again brought to the DSS rather than being restored to ICPC custody.
As of the time she talked, El-Rufai had refused to exit the vehicle.
“He told them that if you want to take me inside DSS custody, you will have to physically force me into doing this because you had an agreement.
“When Justice AbdulMalik said I should go to DSS in the first instance, we told her that there are subsisting orders. And she said, let DSS and ICPC go and decide who will keep him—and you people decided they are keeping him with ICPC.
“What has changed?” she queried.
Hasiat further revealed that el-Rufai, who has been in detention for 91 days, was denied access to his personal physicians in breach of a court order issued by Justice Aikawa of the Kaduna State High Court, which granted him unrestricted access to his attorneys and doctors.
She stated that the ICPC’s own in-house doctor had suggested that el-Rufai undergo medical testing, following which the doctors agreed to return to review the findings with him.
That agreement, she claimed, was later ignored.
“When you see a doctor and you run tests, you are expected to see the doctor back so that he explains what the problem is. He was denied access to the doctor because, in their own explanation, they said Malam was not aware that the doctor was coming. I asked Malam—Malam said nobody told him,” she said.
The family’s demands were straightforward: el-Rufai’s quick return to ICPC custody in accordance with existing court orders, restoration of his access to personal physicians, and a stop to what they described as psychological suffering for both the former governor and his family.
El-Rufai’s son and House of Representatives member, Hon. Bello el-Rufai, was adamant that the entire issue was politically driven, challenging the stringency of bail terms that he claimed were purposefully engineered to be hard to achieve.
“Who keeps a person for 91 days? Why were the terms of the bail so stringent that they are practically impossible for anybody to meet? Why do you have to say that the Kaduna State Council of Chiefs will have to give an attestation? Why are we saying that it has to be a government staff of level 17, with a house in Asokoro or Maitama? Which civil servant has N100 million?
“What are we trying to do — are we trying to make people come out so that they can be targeted too?” he asked.
He also accused the ICPC of making misleading assertions, claiming that the institution has misled at least once before, and vowed to deliver a formal petition to his House colleagues on the subject.
Dr. Uche Dialla, director general of the el-Rufai Support Group Association, described the situation as one of broader national concern, citing United Nations conventions against psychological torture and arguing that the manner in which el-Rufai was shuttled between agencies and courtrooms constituted deliberate psychological harm.
“Torture is not just physical torture. When you take a man psychologically—he is in the custody of ICPC, and then he goes to court, and when there is a break, you take him to another environment—that is psychological torture. His bag and his toothbrush are with ICPC. He is not there by choice. He was confined there by the orders of a court. Anything other than taking him back there would be deliberately torturing him,” Dialla said.
Senator Lawal Adamu of Kaduna Central, who came on the scene during the news conference, appealed for el-Rufai’s quick release, adding that the former governor had freely returned from Cairo to surrender to authorities.
“He was outside this country. He was invited by the ICPC, and he flew all the way from Cairo back to Nigeria to submit himself. We are calling for his immediate release. He deserves to be granted bail on the basis of self-recognition. What is happening is psychological harassment because of politics,” the senator said.
