- * 'They Seized, Returned My Passport'...Lanre
By Celestine Okafor (Editor-in-Chief) @CeleOkaf11
The Department of State Services (DSS), on Thursday, denied that it's operatives in Lagos ever arrested and detained senior journalist, activist and media trainer, Comrade Lanre Arogundade.
A news report appeared in some local news portal on Thursday, February 10, 2022, stating that Arogundade was arrested by the operatives of the Nigeria Immigrations Service (NIS) at the Murtala Mohammed International Airport, Ikeja, Lagos, on his arrival from Banjul, in Gambia.
The reports also said that the Immigration officials later handed him over to the operatives of the DSS, who kept him in detention since his arrival from Gambia. According the reports, Arogundade was arrested on the pretext that he is on a wanted list. The report quoted Arogundade to have said that such experience was regular each time he travels out of the country.
But in a swift response to an enquiry by this news medium on Thursday evening, February 10, 2022, about the true situation of the activist journalist, Comrade Lanre Arogundade, in the hands of DSS, spokesman of the State Security Service, Dr Peter Afunnanya, told NIGERIAN NEWSLEADER Newspaper Online, that Lanre was neither arrested nor detained by the DSS in lagos.
Dr Afunnanya revealed to this news medium that "Nobody was arrested and nobody was detained. Lanre's (Arogundade) story was a fluke, it's not true. Lanre is in his house. Why wouldn't they call Lanre to confirm from him about the so-called arrest and detention? It's not even a story to be written. Some overzealous people just put pen on paper".
However, the man in the eye of the storm, Comrade Lanre Arogundade, reacting on his Facebook page on Thursday afternoon at about 4:00pm, wrote thus: "This is me at the DSS office at International Airport Lagos where I'm being held or detained against my wish.
"I have just returned from Banjul where I went to train Gambian journalists on Conflict sensitive journalism. Ever since the days of military rule, I get molested by DSS and Immigration at the airport. This nonsense has to stop!", Arogundade maintains.
He thereafter thanked his friends, fans and colleagues shortly after he was let off the hook, saying "To all...thanks. My passport has been returned by the DSS and I'm now just leaving the airport despite arriving since 3.30pm. I will update further".
Amidst claims, denials and controversy, over whether or not, Comrade Arogundade was actually arrested and detained by the Immigration Service and the DSS officials shortly after his arrival at the Murtala Muhammed International Airport (MMA), Ikeja, Lagos from an alleged media training trip in Banjul, the Gambian capital, NIGERIAN NEWSLEADER ONLINE tried to ascertain between the DSS, Lanre Arogundade and the news media reports, who indeed was correct in the Arogundade saga.
According to Dictionary.com, to "arrest" (which is a Verb used with object), simply means: "to seize (a person) by legal authority or warrant; take into custody or to catch and hold; attract and fix; engage: to check the course of; stop; slow down".
The noun of it also means to "take a person into legal custody, as by officers of the law. Any seizure or taking by force. An act of stopping or the state of being stopped".
Therefore, if a person is arrested, they can be held in custody until bail is granted or the case is brought to court, for instance.
However, the same Dictionary.Com also defined "detention" (which is a Noun) as: the state of being detained; maintenance of a person in custody or confinement, especially while awaiting a court decision or that of a higher or approving authority; the withholding of what belongs to or is claimed by another".
In summary, therefore, detention is a temporary measure, and a person is detained for a limited period before releasing them or arresting them based on the evidence collected. NNL.
