Two aggrieved Nigerian firms and their staff have instituted a N1 billion suit against the Inspector General of Police and four others before the High Court of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) over alleged rights violations and destruction of assets.
In the fundamental rights enforcement suit, marked: CV/65/2026, filed by their lawyer, B. S. Akinwumi, the two firms, Landseeds Integrated Services Ltd and Ten Thousand Seeds Ltd, accused the IGP and other respondents in the suit of unlawfully destroying their assets.
On their part, the employees – Gbemileke Abiodun, Akinwale Olabode, Adenike Adesoji, Goodluck Olatunde, and Tobi George – accused the respondents of unlawfully arresting and detaining them and of continuing to threaten them with further arrest, detention, and prosecution.
Listed as respondents with the IGP in the suit are the Nigeria Police Force (NPF); Commissioner of Police, Lagos State Command; ACP Sadiq Mana, O/C X-Squad, Lagos Police Command, and Abayomi Oluwadamilare Sotonade.
The applicants stated that on February 10, the five staff members were minding their businesses at their desks in the two companies when agents of the first to the fourth respondents (IGP, NPF, Lagos Police Commissioner and Mana) allegedly invaded their offices in gestapo style, destroying the firms’ properties, disrupting their business and arresting Abiodun, Olabode and Adesoji (first, second and third applicants).
They added that the fourth and fifth applicants (Olatunde and George) were severely injured at the premises of the firms in the course of the invasion and that the first to third applicants were bundled away in booth of the invading security agents’ vehicle “in dehumanizing manner and were dumped in the cell of the Lagos State Police Command on the 10 day of February 2026.
“On the morning of the 11th February 2026, the first to third applicants were taken to the office of the fourth respondent (Mana), where they were told that the fifth respondent (Sotonade) was the petitioner on whose behest the security agents acted.”
The applicants further stated that they later learnt that Sotonade complained that one Olabode John Fatoye collected N23million from him and some others for some land transactions while being a staff member of the sixth applicant (Ten Thousand Seeds Ltd).
They denied being part of the transactions, adding that it was later discovered that those who made payments paid to the account of another firm, Voyage Integrated Services, owned by one Shakirat Abiodun Abdusalam, which has no relationship with the applicants.
The applicants stated that the respondents “are already on the trail of the Olabode John Fatoye, and have already charged one of his accomplices, named Adewale Oluwole, before a Lagos State Magrstrate Court in Charge No. P/64/2025 and he is currently in detention due to his inability to meet his bail conditions.”
They added that even though the respondents identified the alleged culprits—Olabode John Fatoye, Adewale Oluwole, and Shakirat Abiodun Abdusalam—who reportedly collected the money in question, they still detained the first to third applicants for three days.
The applicants further stated that although the first to third applicants were later released on February 12, the respondents have allegedly persisted in asking the applicants to repay the N23m to the fifth respondent, despite existing evidence that they knew nothing about the land transactions and the payments made.
They denied having any transaction with Sotonade or any of the individuals whose money Olabode John Fatoye and his collaborators, Adewale Oluwole and Shakirat Abiodun Abdusalam, collected.
“The applicants therefore verily believe that it is in the interest of justice that this honourable court intervenes to grant the reliefs claimed in this action and to ensure that the first to fourth respondents do not abuse their investigative and prosecutorial powers.”
They are praying the court to, among others, declare their arrest and detention unlawful, and issue a perpetual injunction to restrain the respondents from further harassing and threatening them with arrest and detention over the issue.
The applicants are also seeking an order, directing the first to fourth respondents to pay to them, severally and jointly, the sum of N1 billion as damages for the breach of their fundamental rights.