Court Bars Reporters from Trial of Alleged Coup Plotters, Orders Their Speedy Trial

Alex Enumah and Linus Aleke in Abuja

A Federal High Court in Abuja, yesterday, ordered journalists out of the venue of the trial of six defendants, accused of complicity in the alleged plot to forcefully take over the government of President Bola Tinubu.

Some journalists, who were covering the proceedings had arrived at the court premises around 8am, and as usual secured their seats on the last row in court, awaiting the commencement of trial.

However, a few minutes to 9am, an official of the court announced that those who were unable to secure a seat should vacate the courtroom as the judge did not permit people standing during proceedings.

Responding, those without seats, including lawyers, started making their way out of the court room, when another official of the court and a security personnel attached to the court came to where journalists sat and asked them to stand up and exit the courtroom immediately.

According to the court staff, the presiding judge, Justice Joyce Abdulmalik, gave them the instruction not to allow journalists inside her court.

When told that the trial of the alleged coup plotters was of public importance and that there was no court order that proceedings should be conducted without media presence, the officials insisted they were acting on the judge’s instruction.

Shortly after the journalists were successfully evicted, the security official locked the door, following which the judge commenced sitting thereafter.

Justice Abdulmalik had last week ordered accelerated trial of the six defendants and adjourned to April 27, for the commencement of trial.

She made the order, shortly after the defendants including Major General Mohammed Ibrahim Gana (rtd), Captain (NN) Erasmus Ochegobia Victor (rtd), Inspector Ahmed Ibrahim, Zekeri Umoru, Bukar Kashim Goni, and Abdulkadir Sani, were arraigned on a 13-count criminal charge.

The six defendants were in the charge marked: FHC/ABJ/CR/206/2026 alleged to have plotted to levy war against the state to overthrow the president of the country.

They, however, pleaded not guilty to all the counts contained in the charge.

At the proceedings of April 22, Abdulmalik, who declined to take oral argument in the bail application of the defendants, ordered that the defendants be remanded in the custody of the Department of State Service (DSS).

The defendants, it would be recalled, had been in the custody of the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA) since their arrest and denied access to any lawyer or family member.

They were brought before a court for the first time last Wednesday, with the 1st defendant, Gana, on a wheelchair.

According to the charge filed by the Office of the Attorney-General of the Federation (AGF), the defendants were alleged to have plotted to levy war against the Federal Republic of Nigeria to overthrow President Tinubu.

The alleged offence, according to the prosecution was contrary to and punishable under Section 37 (2) of the Criminal Code.

In one of the counts, the defendants were accused alongside former Bayelsa State governor, Timipre Sylva, said to be “at large”, of money laundering linked to terrorism financing, treason, terrorism and failure to disclose security intelligence.

In another count, the defendants allegedly “conspired with one another to levy war against the state to overthrow the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria,” an offence punishable under Section 37 Subsection 2 of the Criminal Code.

The prosecution further alleged that the defendants had prior knowledge of a planned treasonable act involving one Colonel Mohammed Alhassan Ma’aji and others but failed to alert authorities.