Agents of the Nigerian Police Force, Kaduna State command on Saturday picked two lecturers in Zaria over a petition they wrote on alleged overstay in office by the Director General of the National Research Institute of Chemical Technology (NARICT).
The petitioners, Dr. Ahmad Aliyu Palladan and Malam Bashir Ibrahim Bomo had addressed their letter to President Muhammadu Buhari under the banner of Concerned Zaria Citizens.
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Palladan and Bomo who teach at the Federal College of Education, Zaria and Gombe respectively alleged that the DG of NARICT, Zaria, Professor Tsware Barinas Jeffery is only entitled to a five-year single tenure, citing the new civil service rule that was passed in 2019.
They further alleged that the tenure of Prof. Jeffery ought to have ended on May 26, 2021, but with the 2019 law, he was given an additional one year and therefore supposed to leave office by May 26, 2022.
The petition reads in part: “Surprisingly, other research institutions under the same Federal Ministry of Science and Technology have already demonstrated their patriotic commitment towards implementing the extant provisions of 2019 Revised Condition of Service of the Research Institutes regarding the tenure and the appointment of Director/Chief Executive Officer of their respective institutes.
Daily Trust gathered that on the premise of the petition, the police whisked the duo from their different homes in Zaria to Kaduna where they were detained at the command’s Gabasawa detention facility.
When contacted, the spokesperson of the Kaduna State police command, ASP Aliyu Mohammed Jalige, requested the names of the detainees and promised to confirm their status by Monday, July 18.
The two lecturers yesterday afternoon told one of their lawyers that no charges were prepared against them and were not asked to write any statement even after spending more than 24 hours in police detention, our correspondent was told.
