A source in the service told the Sunday Tribune that operatives have located the former minister who is believed to be hiding in the home of his friend at Minister’s Hill, Maitama, Abuja.
Operatives of the service had, on Friday, invaded the Abuja home of Mallam el-Rufai following his failure to honour an invitation extended to him on Thursday.
The former minister was invited by the SSS to explain the provocative statement credited to him in a media report on Thursday. But he was nowhere near the house when the operatives visited.
It was also learnt on Saturday that a lawyer friend of the former minister had volunteered to take him to the headquarters of the SSS on Monday.
It was learnt that the lawyer had already given his words to the DSS on the issue.
A highly placed source in the know said: “His (el-Rufai) lawyer says he’ll come with him to our office on Monday. We are taking him on his words. We know where he is hiding in his friend’s house at the Minister’s Hill in Maitama. We are not moving in on him. We believe his lawyer is a gentleman. But if by Monday he refuses to come then we know what to do. We are still extending our usual civility to him,” the source stated.
Source: Tribune
UPDATE: We will produce El-Rufai on monday - APC
If everything goes according to plans, a former Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nasir El-Rufai, who is being hunted by the Department of State Security Service, SSS, will on Monday willingly surrender himself to the agency.
The former minister, to be accompanied by a yet unknown number of chieftains of his All Progressives Party, plans to arrive the SSS headquarters in the Asokoro District of Abuja at 9 a.m. on Monday, sources familiar with the plan told PREMIUM TIMES.
Party chieftains, who have volunteered to accompany him to the SSS office plan to converge at the former minister’s home in the Maitama District of Abuja.
The group, to be joined by Mr. El-Rufai’s lawyers, will then drive in a convoy to the SSS office and wait for him to be interrogated and released.
A chieftain of the APC and one of those who might accompany the former minister, Osita Okechukwu, sent text messages to journalists on Sunday afternoon, requesting them to arrive at a location in the Maitama District at 8.30 a.m Monday to join Mr. El-Rufai’s delegation to the SSS.
Sources close to Mr. El-Rufai said the former minister agreed to honour the SSS’ invitation following claims by the agency late on Friday that it had obtained a valid arrest warrant from a competent court.
Mr. El-Rufai had gone underground Friday after the SSS launched a manhunt for him after he failed to honour an invitation from the agency in connection with his remarks at a conference in Abuja on Wednesday that there might be violence if the 2015 general elections were not credible.
The former minister declined the invitation citing his pending suit against the Service over his detention in a hotel in Awka during the Anambra State Governorship last November 16 as reason.
Mr. El-Rufai also insisted on seeing a warrant of arrest before he could report to the SSS office.
On Friday, operatives of the SSS stormed two properties believed to belong to Mr. El-Rufai, looking for him.
At the second property late on Friday, the SSS operatives insisted they wanted to deliver the warrant to Mr. El-Rufai personally, ignoring entreaty by his lawyer that the document should be handed over to him.
The opposition APC has condemned the SSS for haunting its deputy national secretary, saying the comments attributed to the former minister were not inciting in any way.
Mr. El-Rufai himself said he would resist ploys by the SSS to silence him.
“Mallam El-Rufai will not be silenced,” the former minister said through his media advisor, Muyiwa Adekeye, Friday. “He will continue to do his patriotic duty of challenging INEC and the security agencies to guarantee the climate for free and fair elections in Nigeria by desisting from partisanship and the embrace of impunity.”
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