The Public Relations Officer (PRO) of the Peoples Democratic Party ( PDP) in Gombe local government area of Gombe state, Khalid Mu’azu Izala, has been arrested by the men of the Nigerian Police Force.
Information gathered by Daylight Reporters revealed that Izala was arrested on Friday, 28th August 2020 by the lowcost division of the police force base on the complaint by an All Progressives Congress (APC) stalwart, Garba Mohammed Mairago.
He was arraigned before justice Bello Shariff the same day he was arrested where he was later remanded in police custody.
He was moved to the prison on Sunday evening.
At the hearing today, defence council, Barristers Habu Abdu and Benjamin Sati applied for his bail and that was objected by the police prosecutor, Sergeant Joel Peter.
The matter was adjourned by the presiding judge Bello Shariff and the accused has been remanded in Gombe prison until 8th September, 2020.
As obtained by Daylight Reporters, below is the Facebook post of the complainant Garba Mohammed Mairago, an APC stalwart in Hausa language which means;
“Khalid Mu’azu Izala, Baban Fati, we shall meet.”
However, Izala responded to Garba Mohammed Mairago’s post in Hausa language on Facebook as follows,
“Some members of the APC are planning to launch an attack on members of PDP social Media.
“It is obvious that anybody following what is happening between us (PDP) and the members of the APC, some of their members, particularly Mairago and his likes are terrorising our members for exercising our constitutional right of opposition.”
According to the First Information Report obtained, Izala was accused of defamation of character.
It was also gathered that Mohammed Mairago, alleged that Izala used his Facebook page sometime in 2019 to write defamatory statements against him (Mairago) and some unnamed members of the APC in the state.
However, some commentators in the state observed that the arrest and arraignment of the PDP PRO was a witch-hunt opining that members of the opposition party are at liberty according to the laws of the land to criticize the ruling party and those in power constructively.
