SSS Wants to Pause Sowore's Trial for 2027 Elections

The State Security Service (SSS), also called DSS, is asking to pause the ongoing cyberstalking trial of Omoyele Sowore. Sowore is a human rights activist and the presidential candidate of the African Action Congress (AAC). The SSS wants him to be fully involved in the 2027 elections.

In a statement shared with PREMIUM TIMES, the SSS media team said that the agency's director general, Oluwatosin Ajayi, has told the legal team to take steps to temporarily suspend the case.

On 3 August, the trial judge, Mohammed Umar, postponed the next court date to 20 September. At this hearing, the prosecution plans to ask the court for a long delay until sometime in 2027.

The SSS stated that the trial will continue after the presidential election in 2027. This request comes as political activities are increasing ahead of next year's elections.

But the SSS did not clarify what will happen if Sowore becomes president. It is not new for prosecutions of candidates to be put on hold before elections. This practice does not follow any legal rule and is left to the discretion of the prosecution.

Such actions are part of unwritten rules in criminal justice systems worldwide. These rules are often used to create an impression of fair prosecution without bias. This situation is particularly notable because Sowore is being charged with allegedly defaming President Bola Tinubu, who is also running for president in the 2027 elections.

Festus Ogun, a constitutional lawyer, told PREMIUM TIMES that the SSS's request lacks legal grounding. He said it is an abuse of judicial process. Ogun suggested that the SSS should have withdrawn or ended the case.

The SSS lawyer could not be reached for comments. His phone was not reachable and he did not respond to a text sent to him.

This newspaper reported that the SSS charged Sowore after he criticized President Bola Tinubu on social media, calling him a "criminal." Sowore made these comments after Tinubu's official visit to Brazil, where the president claimed his government has fought corruption in Nigeria.

The SSS gave Sowore seven days to delete his posts from social media. But Sowore refused, which led to legal action from the secret police. The case has been ongoing for over ten months. The SSS first charged Sowore with five counts, seeking to clarify whether anyone can label the President or others as criminals without a court ruling.

In this case, X Corps and Meta Corporation, which own the platforms where Sowore made his posts, were named as co-defendants. However, there were no specific charges against them. Later, the prosecution changed the charges, reducing them to two and dropping the tech companies from the case.

The Request for Suspension

The SSS media team said this request came after a meeting on 20 August among Ajayi, Kehinde, and officials from the SSS legal team. The SSS director said the suspension would allow Sowore to fully engage in the campaigns for the presidential election set for 16 January 2027.

The SSS stated, "The DSS boss told the Senior Advocate and his directorate that, with the start of presidential campaigns, it would be fair to pause the court case. This way, Sowore can participate in the upcoming elections without any barriers."

The SSS argued that suspending the case would not harm the legal process, which has been in court for nearly a year. The ongoing case has been postponed 11 times since it began last year. The last postponement was on 3 August, with the next hearing set for 20 September. The SSS plans to formally communicate this request to the Federal High Court starting from 14 September, when the court resumes after its annual break.

This is not the first time Sowore has faced legal challenges for statements the Nigerian government viewed as attacks against a sitting president. In 2019, the Attorney-General charged him and Olawale Bakare with treasonable felony for calling for a #RevolutionNow protest. The SSS held Sowore for months after arresting him in August 2019. But the trial made little progress, facing many delays, until the Tinubu administration came into power in 2023 and dropped the charges in February 2024.