The lawyer was sentenced without due process on July 27, 2022.
A rights group, Centre for Change (CFC), led by Joe Okei-Odumakin has condemned the imprisonment of human rights lawyer, Inibehe Effiong by the Chief Judge of Akwa Ibom State, Ekaette Obot.
Effiong is serving a one-month prison sentence for alleged contempt of court after asking Obot to recuse herself from a case she’s handling. He had also questioned the judge for allowing armed security agents with AK-47 rifles into the courtroom.
The lawyer was sentenced without due process on July 27, 2022.
The human rights lawyer, who is also the National Legal Adviser of the African Action Congress (AAC), was in court to defend Leo Ekpenyong, a lawyer, in a libel suit filed by Udom Emmanuel, governor of Akwa Ibom.
Meanwhile, the illegal imprisonment has attracted condemnation from civil society organisations and many Nigerians.
On August 3, the NBA said Effiong was not given fair hearing before he was sent to prison by Obot, and the organisation threatened to petition the judge at the National Judicial Council (NJC).
In a statement on Sunday, Centre for Change asked the relevant authorities to save the day by effecting the immediate release of the lawyer and punishing the judge.
The statement read, “The travail of Inibehe Effiong and our frequently tragic judicial process. We see the picture of scraping in incarceration of a man used to barbing.
“We see the picture of a man summarily sentenced in beard-shearing instead of shaving. Sitting on bare floor instead of a seat.
“We hear from lawyers about devious devices to keep appeal processes at bay and enforce jaundiced justice.
“While we await the truth or denial of these reports, we call on all the authorities relevant to this eyesore to save the day by effecting the immediate release of Barrister Inibehe Effiong, after which a clean court process should commence to effect lawful measures on whoever is/are responsible for this national embarrassment and disrepute.
“We should not close our eyes to this brazen disregard for human dignity and rights in 2023 Nigeria. People have fought, bled, suffered detention and died so that this would stop. It must stop.”
On Friday, a human rights organisation, Citizenship Civic Awareness Centre, otherwise known as Democracy Vanguard also condemned the treatment meted out to Inibehe.
SaharaReporters on Thursday reported that Effiong's beard was forcibly shaved off by prison officials.
Describing the action as draconian, the group called on NBA to boycott courts in Akwa Ibom state in solidarity with Effiong and other inmates that are subjected to judicial and prison brutality in silence.
SaharaReporters last Wednesday reported that the lawyer was secretly transferred from the Ikot Ekpene Medium Security Custodial Centre to the Uyo Custodial Centre.
“Staff of the Nigerian Prison Service at the Uyo Medium Security Custodial Centre have forcibly shaved Inibehe Effiong’s beard. We were denied access to see but someone who saw him confirmed this,” a source told SaharaReporters on Thursday.
But Democracy Vanguard in a statement in reaction to the treatment meted out to Effiong, signed by its Executive Director, Adeola Soetan, said for such a barbaric action to have happened in a prison now called correctional centre, has ridiculed that name —correctional —and any objective in focus for the change of name.
The statement partly read, "So what did Barrister Effiong do to warrant another round of persecution, attack, ridicule, embarrassment and conscious attempt to kill him in spirit and physically? Even Boko Haram terrorists and economic terrorist looters were not subjected to such inhuman treatment. This is unacceptable, condemnable, draconic, illegal, brutal, uncivilized, provocative and shameful."
It added, "No prisoner or detainee should be subjected to any punishment outside his/her warrant of sentence by the court. If not, the prisons may be turned into an abattoir of humans and their human rights.
"NBA should declare a boycott of court in that state of lawlessness and impunity as solidarity with Effiong and other inmates that are subjected to judicial and prison brutality in silence and to protect our laws and humanity from prowling beasts everywhere.”