By Amos Odeh, Yenagoa
A Yenagoa-based female lawyer, Edna Ndubuisi, has raised alarm over “persistent threats by armed men who claimed to be ex-militants.”
The ex-militants, who are plaintiffs in a lawsuit on their stipends with commercial banks, reportedly on November 19, 2019, armed with pistols and other dangerous weapons, besieged Ndubuisi’s office to warn her to hands off the case.
Ndubuisi, managing solicitor of the law firm, A. S. E. Bisi & Partners, said on Monday that she was compelled to submit a petition to the Bayelsa Police Command and the judge, Federal High Court, Yenagoa.
She said that reports by her staff who received the ‘threat message’ indicate that the ex-militants who came on the mission were seven in number.
According to her, the group had accosted her within the Federal High Court premises with similar threats, a development that made her to write a petition to the presiding judge over her plight.
She urged the police to take urgent steps to halt the plans and ensure that the hoodlums do not fulfill their mission, adding that she remains undeterred and would pursue her cases to their logical conclusions.
“On November 19, 2019 a group of militants numbering about seven and armed with pistol and other dangerous weapons stormed the office of A. S. E. Bisi & Partners at about 13:00 hours (1pm) demanding to see me.
“I was at that time attending to her cases in court.
“The ex-militants were led by a man who simply gave his name as K.F. identified the persons as representatives of ex-militants.
“Only two lawyers and the office secretary were in the office as other lawyers were in court attending to the office matters.
“They delivered a message through their leader, K.F., to the effect that “we shall get her anywhere she runs to, whether within or outside Bayelsa State, and that she and her family have no hiding place anywhere in Nigeria.”
“The genesis of the matter stems from some cases I handled and some other cases currently pending before the federal High Court and state High Court, Yenagoa, Bayelsa.
“The cases involve some members of ex-militants which the law firm is defending some of the Nigerian commercial banks in Yenagoa,” she said