Charles Okah, who is being tried for treason in Abuja, has sued the Nigerian Prisons Service (NPS), seeking N500million compensation over alleged violation of his right to life.
He is being tried with one other person over their alleged involvement in the 2010 Independence Day bombing in Abuja.
They are arraigned on a one-count charge with 22 particulars of overt acts of treason and another eight-count charge of terrorism.
Their trial before the Federal High Court, Abuja had been stalled lately owing to the Federal Government’s inability to ascertain Okah’s mental health status.
Trial judge, Justice Gabriel Kolawole, had, in view of Okah’s strange behaviour and claim by his lawyer that he was too ill to stand trial, ordered the government to present him before experts at the National Hospital, Abuja for psychiatric evaluation.
Okah, had once urinated in open court during proceedings. The federal government is yet to produce an acceptable report of the psychiatric evaluation before the court.
He is being detained in Kuje Prison, Abuja.
The report is expected at the next adjourned date on May 12.
Okah claimed, in the suit filed by his lawyer, Festus Keyamo, that the prison authorities locked him inside a solitary cell while the cell was being fumigated.
He stated that as a result of the chemicals he inhaled from the fumigation, he became nauseous, weak and finds it difficult to breath.
Okah said he was not given drugs to treat himself and when his wife brought the drugs prescribed for him, the prison authorities seized them.
source: nigerianeye
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