Ex-Baylesa Governor, Chief Diepreye Solomon Peter Alamieyeseigha died in a
Port Harcourt Hospital on Saturday, October 10, 2015 after suffering a
cardiac arrest.
Pro-APC news media carried the news last week
that the British Government had re-opened its case against
Alamieyeseigha and extradition request had been made to President
Buhari. To the extent that some of them, in announcing his death had
mentioned that he died because he was fearful of being extradited to the
UK where he would have been jailed.
Sahara
Reporters in an obituary for Alamieyeseigha Saturday reported, “The
former Governor returned from Dubai recently as it emerged that the
government of the United Kingdom requested his extradition over an
unfinished corruption and money laundering cases. The request, which had
been criticized by Ijaw groups loyal to the former Governor, was seen
as a political vendetta by the President Buhari Administration.”
“We have already discussed it and the Nigerian
government knows our views. But we would like to see him return and
answer the charge in the UK,” Pocock maintained in the interview.
APC
chieftain and chairman of the Presidential Advisory Committee on
Corruption, Professor Itse Sagay, was quoted in the media saying that
“President Buhari-led government is prepared to assent to the request of
the British Government as the United Kingdom has every legal right to
demand for the extradition of the former Bayelsa State Governor”.
Prominent
Ijaw leaders and groups in reaction to his death have accused the All
Progressives Congress and the Federal Government led by President
Muhammadu Buhari of hounding the man whom his affectionately called,
Governor General of Ijaw Nation to death by pursuing after him to
extradite him to the United Kingdom to face crimes of which he had been
convicted, jailed, and released in Nigeria.
The High Commission called the reports “a rumour
in its entirety” and there was “no renewed move to reopen the case” and
said that the Nigerian media got carried away by the interview granted
by the British Envoy to Nigeria, Andrew Pocock because there was a new
government.
Excerpts from the ThisDay report below:
A
senior officer of the Commission, who spoke confidently and on anonymity
on telephone in Abuja, said the information is a rumour in its
entirety, adding that the Crown Prosecution has not tabled any
extradition request on Alamiesyeseigha, to the High Commission.
While
responding to whether it is true that that the Crown Prosecution
Service of UK, has made any formal request for Alamieyeseigha’s
extradition, she said the Crown Prosecution Service more often do not
often give or confirm information on such matters.
She however
disclosed that there is no renewed move to reopen the case. “As you
know, the immediate past High Commissioner, Sir Andrew Pocock, before he
left Nigeria, had in an interview averred that the manner in which
Alamieyeseigha escaped from UK, made him a wanted a person.
“But
as you know and with the new government of President Muhammdadu Buhari,
in place, the media is presenting it as if the UK has said that we need
this man. There is no such thing as moves for his extradition or of
anybody or organisation to recall his extradition to UK,” she said.
“Like you know, the media find such issues interesting. They just jumped
to and start publishing the way they like, without clarifications from
the High Commission.”
In September 2005, Alamieyeseigha (then the
Bayelsa State governor) was detained by the London Metropolitan Police
on charges of money-laundering.
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