There were indications on Thursday that the detained leader of the Niger Delta People�s Volunteer Force, Alhaji Mujahid Asari-Dokubo, was under a fresh security siege.
His wife, Mujahidat, alleged that he was on Wednesday �abducted� by some plain clothes security operatives from Area 10, State Criminal Investigation Department in Abuja.
But Lagos lawyer and counsel to Asari-Dokubo, Mr. Festus Keyamo, said the militant was arrested,� from police custody by men of the SSS on the grounds that fresh charges were being prepared against him.
The allegations were, however, not confirmed by the SSS and the police in Abuja.
Mujahidat told our correspondents in an interview in Port Harcourt that her husband�s life might be in danger as family and relations could not trace his whereabouts.
She alleged that those who took Asari-Dokubo away had said they were taking him to the Aso Rock Villa. But the security agents, according to her, suddenly made a detour a few kilometres away from the State CID.
Mujahidat said, �We don�t know where he is being kept. The development clearly shows that my husband�s life is in danger. For your information, my husband is placed on a certain diet and our relations are the people that serve him with food at the State CID.
My husband�s case is in the court and the court had ordered that he should be kept at a certain place.
He was in Kuje Prison before he was taken to the State CID. We want the international community to know that there is injustice in this country and the life of my husband is in danger.
My husband has no criminal record before his present ordeal. If anything happens to him in the course of their serving him a diet apart from the ones he is used to, the Peoples Democratic Party-led Federal Government should be held responsible.�
Mujahidat said his husband�s travail might not be unconnected with the display of his posters in the streets of Port Harcourt, indicating that he had governorship ambition.
Another report by the Agence France Presse also quoted her as saying, �The people are out to kill my husband. They do not want peace in the Niger Delta. If the police are tired of keeping him, they should take him to prison custody.�
Keyamo, in a statement made available to our correspondent in Lagos, alleged that the Deputy Commissioner of Police, Force Criminal Investigation Department Annex, Area 10, Abuja, Mr. Fatai Shitu, voluntarily surrendered Asari-Dokubo to the SSS operatives.
He said the detainee was taken to the SSS headquarters in Abuja, where he was detained for a fresh offence that has not been disclosed.
The lawyer said since his re-arrest, Asari-Dokubo�s family members, friends and lawyers had been denied access to him.
Keyamo pleaded with the Federal Government to charge the detainee to court for whatever fresh offence he had committed, otherwise he (Keyamo) would proceed to court to ensure a speedy trial.
But the spokesman of the SSS, Ado Mu�azu, when contacted in Abuja, denied knowledge of the re-arrest. He told our correspondent on the phone, �I am not aware of the development. I am hearing it for the first time from you.�
The AFP report also quoted the Nigeria Police spokesman, Mr, Haz Iwendi, a deputy commissioner of police, as saying he was not aware that Asari-Dokubo had been moved.
Asari-Dokubo and some other members of the NDPVF are facing treason charges in an Abuja court.