Colonel Mohammed Alhassan Ma’aji, a serving officer in the Nigerian Army, has taken the federal government to the Federal High Court of Nigeria in Abuja over what he calls his protracted and illegal incarceration since September 2025.
The Guardian says that the applicant is asking for his immediate release from jail and N500 million in damages for violating his basic rights in an originating motion filed under the Fundamental Rights (Enforcement Procedure) Rules 2009.
The lawsuit, which is against the Chief of Defence Intelligence, the Chief of Army Staff, the Nigerian Army, and the Attorney General of the Federation, questions the constitutionality of his ongoing incarceration without trial.
Ma’aji, through his lawyer Olalekan Ojo (SAN), claimed that staying in jail for more than six months without being charged in a court of law is a violation of his fundamental rights to freedom and dignity.
Court documents say that the military officer was detained on or around September 30, 2025, along with others, for allegedly plotting to topple the government.
The applicant said that since his arrest, he has been held in a military facility in Abuja without being able to see his family, talk to his lawyers, or get the medical attention he needs.
He also said that the people he was suing didn’t bring him to court in a reasonable amount of time, as required by Sections 34 and 35 of the 1999 Constitution (as amended) and the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights.
Ma’aji is asking the court to declare his continuing arrest unlawful and order his immediate release as one of the things he wants.
He also asked the court to force the respondents to bring him to a competent court within seven days.
The applicant is also asking for N500 million as payment for being held illegally for several months.
A litigation officer swore in an affidavit in his lawyer’s office that the applicant has been held without being able to communicate with anybody since his arrest, and that no formal charges have been issued against him even though the investigations are said to be over.
There is no set date for the hearing of the case.
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