Fresh controversy has erupted around the long-running disappearance of social media activist Abubakar Idris, popularly known as Dadiyata, after a former aide to the Minister of State for Defence, Bello Matawalle, alleged that police officers openly threatened him with the same fate during interrogation.
Musa Muhammad Kamarawa, who served as Senior Special Assistant to Matawalle during his tenure as Governor of Zamfara State, accused two senior police officers of intimidation, unlawful detention, extortion, illegal seizure of his property, and conducting a house search without a valid warrant.
Kamarawa specifically named CSP Hussaini Gimba and CSP Hassan Gimba, calling on the Inspector-General of Police to launch an immediate investigation into what he described as abuse of office and gross violation of his constitutional rights.
According to him, the officers allegedly warned him never to reveal his relationship with Matawalle while he was being interrogated in 2021.
In a shocking allegation, Kamarawa claimed the officers threatened to kill him “as they killed Dadiyata and Saminu S/Fada Gusau,” insisting the threats were made in his presence at Operations Yaki in Kaduna.
“The alleged police officers investigated me partially, looted my money, property and illegally searched my house without a valid search warrant,” Kamarawa alleged.
He further claimed that every video statement recorded from him was made under duress after repeated threats from the officers.
“In the course of investigation, I was coerced by them that I shouldn’t make any attempt to disclose my relationship with former Governor of Zamfara State, Dr Bello Matawalle,” he said.
“That was the main reason in all the video clips they recorded on me under duress, I never disclosed our relationship with him because they threatened to kill me as they killed Dadiyata and Saminu S/Fada Gusau amongst others in my presence at Operations Yaki Kaduna.”
Kamarawa alleged that investigators were more interested in his connection with former Sokoto State Governor, Attahiru Dalhatu Bafarawa, whom he described as their “main target.”
“But they kept asking about my relationship with my uncle, former Governor of Sokoto State, Alhaji Attahiru Dalhatu Bafarawa, who was their main target as instructed by Matawallen Maradun,” he alleged.
He questioned why he was allegedly prevented from mentioning Matawalle in written statements despite working directly under him as an aide in Zamfara State Government.
“My concern is that I was the SSA to Matawallen Maradun during his tenure as governor in Zamfara State, but why did they never allow me to mention him even in my statement, which I wrote under duress?” he asked.
The allegations have once again revived public attention around the mysterious disappearance of Dadiyata, a lecturer and outspoken government critic who was abducted from his residence in Barnawa, Kaduna State, in August 2019 by armed men.
Since his disappearance nearly seven years ago, neither the police nor security agencies have provided any conclusive update regarding his whereabouts, despite sustained pressure from civil society groups and human rights advocates.
Earlier this year, former Kaduna State Governor, Nasir El-Rufai, publicly alleged during an interview on Arise News that former Kano State Governor and ex-APC National Chairman, Abdullahi Umar Ganduje, had links to Dadiyata’s abduction.
El-Rufai claimed Dadiyata was mainly critical of the Kano State Government and not the Kaduna administration.
“He is a critic of the Kano government, it was Ganduje that was his problem,” El-Rufai stated during the interview.
He also alleged that a police officer posted from Kano to Ekiti confessed days after the abduction that operatives were sent from Kano to abduct the activist.
Meanwhile, Dadiyata’s wife, Khadija Ahmed Lane, recently renewed emotional calls for justice, pleading with authorities to return her husband “dead or alive.”
Speaking during a recent visit to the family by Reno Omokri, Khadija emotionally recounted the night her husband was taken from their home in Kaduna.
“He came out from his car and they took him from here,” she said while pointing to the exact location where the abduction occurred.
As of the time of filing this report, neither the Nigeria Police Force nor Minister Bello Matawalle had officially responded to Kamarawa’s allegations.