By Chibuike Nwabuko
ABUJA (PRECISE POST) – Human rights lawyer and former Chairman of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), Chidi Odinkalu, has accused the Department of State Services (DSS) of abusing its powers by prosecuting a former Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) branch chairman Nkup Gabriel Tsenyen over a land dispute already before a court in Plateau State.
In a statement released on his X handle on Sunday, Odinkalu alleged that the charges filed under the Cybercrimes Act against Tsenyen, a former Chairman of the NBA Shendam Branch, were an “egregious abuse of power” orchestrated by the family of the President of the Court of Appeal, Justice Monica Dongban Mensem.
According to Odinkalu, Tsenyen, who hails from the Ngotugu’ut community in Plateau State, the same community as the Court of Appeal President, instituted a suit before the Plateau State High Court in Shendam in 2025 over a land dispute involving four defendants.
He claimed that one of the defendants, Miskoom Niemu’ut Mensem, is a biological brother of Justice Mensem.
Odinkalu further alleged that the cybercrime charges currently being pursued by the DSS in Abuja stem directly from the same land dispute, arguing that the matter falls outside the agency’s constitutional responsibility of safeguarding Nigeria’s internal security.
He described the prosecution as the “weaponisation” of the DSS for private interests, insisting that the security agency should not be used to influence or interfere in a civil dispute already before a competent court.
The former NHRC chairman called on the Director-General of the DSS Adeola Ajayi to intervene immediately by discontinuing the prosecution, urging that the Plateau State High Court be allowed to determine the land dispute without external interference.
He maintained that allowing the matter to proceed in court without the involvement of security agencies would uphold the rule of law and prevent what he described as an abuse of state power.
