The African Democratic Congress (ADC) has called for a review of the bail conditions granted former governor of Kaduna State, Mallam Nasir El-Rufai.
Justice Joyce Abdulmalike of Federal High Court, Abuja had granted the former governor bail in the sum of N100 million with one surety in like sum.
The court said the should be high-level federal civil servant, and ordered him to surrent his travel documents to the court.
But ADC in a statement by the National Publicity Secretary Mallam Bolaji Abdullahi on Tuesday, described the bail as “punitive and disproportionate.”
The party said the bail conditions should conform with “the Constitution and the fundamental principle that bail is intended to secure attendance at trial, not to inflict punishment before conviction.”
ADC also accused the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) of denying El-Rufai access to his his wife, children, legal team, and personal medical practitioners.
The statement therefore demands “an immediate end to the harsh, degrading and unnecessarily restrictive conditions” under which the former governor was allegedly l being held and supervised.
ADC said President Bola Tinubu cannot continue to hide behind anti-corruption agencies, to keep “criminalising political opposition instead of confronting the grave crises of insecurity, unemployment, inflation, and hunger confronting millions of Nigerians.”
The party regretted that Nigeria’s constitutional democracy has descended into a republic where law enforcement agencies have become instruments of political persecution.
ADC called for full compliance with all constitutional guarantees and internationally recognised standards governing the treatment of persons in custody.
It also said the ICPC should exhibit transparency regarding the legal and factual basis for every restriction imposed on the former governor, as well as an immediate end to the use of state institutions as instruments of political intimidation, vendetta and selective justice.
