Mompha sues EFCC over re-arrest, demands N5m compensation

A socialite, Ismaila Mustapha, also known as Mompha, who is facing money laundering charges, has sued the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) for his “unlawful re-arrest and detention.”

Mompha was allegedly re-arrested last Friday by operatives of the EFCC when he went to their office in Lagos to reclaim his seized items, which Justice Muhammad Liman had ordered to be released to him.

In the suit filed before a Federal High Court, Lagos, by his team of lawyers, who include Mr. Gboyega Oyewole (SAN), Ademola Adefolaju, Kolawole Salami and three others, yesterday, Mompha prayed the court to declare his re-arrest and detention by the EFCC as unjustifiable, unlawful, unconstitutional and a breach of his fundamental human rights as enshrined in the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999 (As amended), among others.

A litigation officer in the law firm of Lords and Temple Attorneys, Kayode Adeboye, who deposed to the 16-paragraph affidavit in support of the application, described Mompha’s arrest as baseless, saying that the applicant is a Nigerian businessman and a first defendant in a matter pending before Justice Liman of the Federal High Court sitting in Lagos and never absconded after being granted bail.

According to Adeboye, in line with the bail conditions, Mompha had been reporting at the EFCC office fortnightly without defaulting.

The court was yet to fix a date to hear Mompha’s N5 million suit as at the time of filing this report.