Posted by Chinenye on Tue 29th Sep, 2026 - tori.ng
Human rights lawyer Femi Falana has taken the Federal Government to an ECOWAS court, demanding $10 million in damages over what he says were several rights violations against him during Nigeria's military era.
(Mr Femi Falana. Photo by Business Post Nigeria)
Lagos human rights lawyer and Senior Advocate of Nigeria Femi Falana has filed a 10 million dollar damages suit against the Federal Government at the ECOWAS Community Court of Justice in Abuja.
He says his rights were violated under several military governments between the 1980s and 1990s.
The suit is numbered ECW/CCJ/APP/30/2026.
Falana says he was unlawfully arrested and detained and that his movement was restricted.
He wants the court to declare the acts unlawful and unconstitutional.
The case rests on his rights to personal liberty, dignity, fair hearing, property and freedom of movement under the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights.
Falana said his first clash with the government came during his NYSC year in Oyo State between 1982 and 1983.
He had defended University of Ibadan students charged with conspiracy and attempted murder over allegations involving the Vice-Chancellor.
He finished his service but says his discharge certificate was withheld because of that defence.
The students won the case, which he cited as Andrew Ogor and Others Chief Magistrate Emmanuel Kolawole and Another (1983).
He said armed agents of the National Security Organisation arrested him at the Lagos High Court on June 8, 1985 and searched his chambers on Jebba Street, Ebute Metta, without a warrant.
They found nothing against him, he said, and took him to their detention centre on Awolowo Road, Ikoyi.
He says he was held for seven weeks with other political detainees and freed on August 30, 1985 after the coup that brought General Ibrahim Babangida to power.
Falana said the Babangida government later renamed the NSO the State Security Service and set up the Justice Samson Uwaifo Panel to look into detention cases.
He told the panel that security officials gave a false reason for his detention.
He also said the SSS stopped him from travelling to a human rights conference in Harare, Zimbabwe in October 1991 and kept his international passport for six months. Dr Olisa Agbakoba, SAN, read his paper at the conference for him.
Falana further claimed that men he identified as SSS officials took him from his Lagos home at about 2am on April 8, 1990, drove him towards the Lagos-Epe road and dumped him in a bush. He found his way to Epe and back to Lagos.
He said the SSS denied any part in it and the military government turned down his request for an investigation.
He added that he was arrested again on May 19, 1992 at the Lagos High Court and held for two days at Bar Beach Police Station before being flown to Abuja with Dr Beko Ransome-Kuti and Baba Omojola, who had also been arrested.