Last Friday, a staff member of the Federal Capital Development Administration (FCDA), Mairiga Hassan Shaharu, was arrested and kept in detention. This was reportedly done on the orders of the Chief Security Officer (CSO) working for FCT Minister Nyesom Wike. Mairiga was accused of leaking documents that revealed Minister Wike had given out large areas of Abuja land to his two underage sons. The report was first published by Peoples Gazette.
However, according to activist Omoyele Sowore, Mairiga doesn’t even work in the land allocation office. He only handles new applications for land and has no access to internal approval systems. That means he couldn’t have been the one who leaked those sensitive documents.
To fight for Mairiga’s freedom, Sowore visited the police post where he was being held. He was joined by two human rights lawyers, Rosemary HamzaHamza and Ak Musa, and later, a third lawyer who had tried to free Mairiga earlier. The third lawyer revealed that Mairiga was being held with the help of a fake court order presented by Wike’s CSO.
When they asked to see the order, the police officer refused. But the lawyer was able to briefly look at it and noticed that it was signed by a magistrate who no longer works in that court. This clearly showed the court order was fake and that Mairiga’s arrest was illegal.
Sowore and the lawyers spent hours talking to the police, but they kept making excuses. At one point, they claimed they couldn’t find the Investigating Police Officer (IPO) in charge. It looked like they were only trying to delay Mairiga’s release.
Later, a senior female officer arrived. She had come from Karu after being called to calm the situation. But even she admitted that she couldn’t release Mairiga because Wike had personally ordered the detention.
Eventually, Wike’s CSO said the matter was now out of his hands and had been passed to FCT Commissioner of Police, CP Wale Ajao. This is the same police boss who recently helped jail a TikToker after a complaint from Senator Ned Nwoko and his wife, Regina Daniels. When Sowore called CP Ajao, he claimed that the detention was legal and based on a valid court order—even though they had already confirmed the order was fake. His only advice was, “Go to court.”
Then, something shocking happened. Wike’s CSO called again and said that Minister Wike wanted to see Sowore in his office the next morning, along with the detained Mairiga. Sowore refused and told him plainly that Wike had no right to summon him, and he would not attend the meeting.
Before hanging up, Sowore asked the most important question:
“If Wike didn’t give land to his children, then why is someone being locked up for leaking documents that don’t exist?”
He ended by saying that Wike should be the one under investigation for giving public land to his children—not Mairiga, who is just an innocent citizen.
