- DSS HQ
By SCM Staff Writer
LAGOS, Nigeria – A TOP Nigerian human-rights lawyer has hailed a “palpable” clean-up at the country’s secretive State Security Service (DSS) after the new boss made a historic pay-out to victims of wrongful detention.
Sir Ifeanyi Ejiofor, Lead Counsel to the controversial Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB), praised the appointment of Mr. Adeola Ajayi as the new Director-General, calling it “a round peg in a round hole.”
But the firebrand lawyer – who has previously clashed with the agency over his clients – immediately turned Oliver Twist, demanding the new DG FREE dozens of other innocent citizens locked up under the old regime.
Ejiofor slammed the DSS’s past as being “marred by rampant abductions, enforced disappearances, and illegal detentions,” particularly targeting Igbo youths, men, and women from the South-East.
Many were seized at night and shipped to notorious facilities like Wawa Barracks since as far back as 2019, denied access to lawyers and family.
In an astonishing turnaround, DG Ajayi – described by the lawyer as having a “humane disposition” – last week took an unprecedented step: he publicly compensated citizens, including several of Igbo extraction, who were wrongfully detained by his predecessor.
Ejiofor described the move as an act of “institutional repentance” and courage, saying it was a gesture more commonly seen in “mature democracies”.
”An institution of government, long associated with impunity and heavy-handedness, would voluntarily depart from entrenched patterns of abuse,” Ejiofor said in a statement. “The transformation within the DSS has been palpable.”
He credited the new boss with transforming the agency from a “fear-driven, coercive force” into a professional intelligence body focused on reducing human-rights infractions and judicial embarrassments.
Despite the praise, Ejiofor insists the clean-up is not finished. He revealed that while a task force is already reviewing similar cases to free the innocent, he is urgently appealing to Ajayi to address the plight of “forgotten detainees” held for years without charge.
”These citizens became victims not of law, but of dangerous and reckless labelling,” he said.
Ejiofor urged Ajayi to order the immediate release of any innocent person held and to promptly charge anyone against whom there is a proper case.
He concluded: “The DSS under Mr. Ajayi has not merely reformed an institution; it has momentarily reminded Nigeria of what good governance ought to look like.”
