Dismiss Briton’s N1bn compensation suit – IG

Inspector-General of Police, Mr. Mohammed Abubakar, has asked a Federal High Court, Abuja  to dismiss a suit in which a Briton, Mr. Khomeini Bukhari, is demanding N1bn as damages for the failure of the police authorities to investigate his complaint that two policemen robbed him at the Millennium Park in Abuja on October 29, 2011. The plaintiff is also claiming the sum as examplary and aggravated damages for a press statement in which the Federal Capital Territory police command cast doubts on the complaint. However, in a preliminary objection he filed in the court,  the IG asked Justice Gabriel Kolawole  to dismiss the suit on the grounds that he was not responsible for the alleged libel and that the action was statute barred. The judge  adjourned the matter till November 20   for the hearing in the preliminary objection filed by  Abubakar. In the suit dated May 25 and filed by his counsel, Mr. Bamidele Aturu, the Briton claimed the police authorities not only failed to investigate his complaint, they made “malicious and libelous” statements against his person. The contentious statement was credited to the Public Relations Officer of the FCT police command, Mr. Jimoh Moshood, on or about December 7, 2011. In the said statement, the FCT police command not only doubted Bukhari’s claims that Samuel Ekpah and Daniel Marcus robbed him, it  insinuated that the plaintiff was of unsound mind. The FCT police command, in the statement, wondered why the plaintiff was carrying about a large sum of money accusing him of trying to embarrass the police. Besides the N1bn he is asking for as damages, the plaintiff also asked the court to order the IG to pay him N1.5m being the combined value of the N200,000 cash and the N1.3m Breitling wrist watch the policemen allegedly collected from him. Bukhari also asked the court to order the IG to publish a public apology to him in three national dailies, for the statements credited to the PPRO of the FCT police command concerning his complaint. He is also asking the court to issue an order of perpetual injunction restraining the IG, his agents, servants, associates and privies from further publishing the “libelous statements” concerning him. The Briton is also seeking “a declaration that the failure, omission, refusal and neglect” of the IG and his officers to investigate the report he made to them concerning the robbery incident amounts to a tortuous breach of a statutory duty to investigate crime, to his detriment. He therefore asked the court for an order of mandamus compelling the IG to investigate the complaint, and make public the outcome of the said investigation. Punch Nigeria