Activist politician, Omoyele Sowore, has described his trial at the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, High Court as a politically scripted trial by the Department of State Services, DSS.
Sowore said the trial was a confirmation of his remarks about President Bola Tinubu which led to his prosecution.
Justice M. G. Umar had granted Sowore bail on self recognition despite prayers by the prosecution and META to have him detained.
Reacting, Sowore posted on X: “Today, the politically scripted trial concocted by the lawless Department of State Services @OfficialDSSNG resumed at the Federal High Court.
“The case before the court is nothing more than naked retaliation for my truthful social media statements, where I described President Bola Ahmed Tinubu exactly as his record and conduct reveal him to be: a criminal, regardless of the propaganda deployed to mask it.
“In a scene befitting an authoritarian farce, the DSS “prosecutor”, Akinlolu Kehinde, SAN, appeared in court pleading for my detention, while attorneys representing @Facebook dutifully concurred with the FGN prosecuting team.
“This was not because I committed any offence, but because my voice threatens the @officialABAT regime. Their objective during today’s arraignment was to cage dissent, soothe bruised egos, and manufacture the illusion that criticism can be criminalized in Nigeria.
“Justice M. G. Umar, however, refused to perform in their poorly written script. Seeing through the absurdity, he granted me bail on self-recognizance, an unmistakable acknowledgment that this prosecution is an assault on free expression and a cowardly attempt to silence a person diametrically opposed to the failed regime; they didn’t even hide it; the Prosecutor asked that the judge make me issue an undertaking not to incite the public against Tinubu.
“I made my position unmistakably clear in open court, I will not be silenced, and that I will continue to challenge rotten policies, expose criminals in power, and speak truth to authority without apology.
“No security agency, no compromised prosecutor, and no dictator masquerading as a president will ever intimidate me into silence.
“We are not backing down because Nigeria’s battered people must be rescued, and we will fight for them, no matter how many sham charges or fabricated trials are thrown our way. #RevolutionNow.”