Omoyele Sowore, the African Action Congress presidential candidate, has rejected a move by the Department of State Services to pause his alleged cybercrime trial until after the 2027 elections and instead called for the agency to withdraw the charges entirely, issue an apology, and discipline the officials involved.
Appearing on The Morning Brief on Monday, Sowore said the secret police had subjected him to a wrongful prosecution. He noted that the case was already before the court when the DSS previously pressed to complete the trial before or during the election period, stating it recognised the political calendar but intended to proceed regardless. The agency has now reversed course and instructed its counsel, Akinlolu Kehinde, SAN, to seek a lengthy adjournment so Sowore can campaign without court interference.
“We are not seeking an adjournment. We want you [DSS] to apologise for doing this to us and to show that you compensate people who are wrongfully tried for committing no crime at all,” Sowore said. He added that those who made the decisions should be removed from the system.
The charges arise from social media posts Sowore published on 25 August 2025 on his X account and Facebook page in which he described President Bola Tinubu as a “criminal.” The DSS issued a seven-day ultimatum for the posts to be deleted. When Sowore refused, the agency filed suit at the Federal High Court in Abuja seeking a ruling on whether it is lawful to publicly label the president or any other person a criminal. X and Meta were initially joined as defendants but were later struck out by the court, leaving Sowore as the sole defendant.
Sowore questioned the DSS’s authority to suspend a case it had started, arguing that the proper course under the law is to withdraw the charges. He accused security agencies of treating the judiciary as an appendage and recounted earlier encounters with the authorities, including the seizure of his passport, an 11-day detention with more than 47 other people after he missed a court appearance, and a 2019 treason charge that kept him in Nigeria for five years and imposed significant hardship on his family.
The activist framed his opposition as a broader objection to what he called injustice rather than a purely personal grievance. The DSS has not publicly responded to his latest demands.
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