Press Release: In response to our family’s challenge to its overreach, the ICPC has issued a statement of which no law enforcement agency can be proud if indeed it is committed to upholding citizens’ fundamental rights, the laws of Nigeria and the Constitution under which those fundamental rights are enshrined.
Let it be on record that the family and supporters of Mallam Nasir El-Rufai have no reason to treat government agencies as infallible masters of the universe. The actions of agencies of the Executive Branch are not beyond scrutiny and criticism, the more so when the heads of those agencies have succumbed to undue influence and become tools of political scheming, rather than law enforcement.
The ICPC statement was unable to deny that it prevented Mallam Nasir El-Rufai’s doctor seeing him on Friday, 15 May 2026. Neither was it able to state that it did not prevent delivery of dinner by his wife later that same evening. Indeed, it cannot deny
The ICPC is aware of court orders granting Mallam access to his family, lawyers and doctors. Yet, this same agency is employing what it calls ‘protocols’ to vitiate these orders of court and render them to be practically of no effect. Otherwise, why is the ICPC placing obstacles in the way of a doctor already identified by Mallam as his physician? While we respect internal administrative procedures, we must protest when those protocols become tools for waging a subtle psychological war on our family or for brazen violations of court orders.
It is obvious to every observer that the ICPC seeks to inflict on Mallam Nasir El-Rufai every act of torture it can conjure as part of the coordinated effort to break him. The duty of the ICPC to secure someone in their custody is not the same thing as treating that person as having even fewer rights than a convict. In what way did preventing the delivery of his dinner amount to securing him, more so considering the rather puerile reason given by the ICPC, that the dinner arrived 30 minutes late. What the ICPC did not say was that this dinner arrived later than usual because the wife who brought the dinner at 7pm had been with Mallam’s medical doctor all through his 2-hour ordeal of delay (3pm - 5pm) earlier that same day. The ICPC knew this, since they caused the delay and should equally have known that it would be physically impossible to prepare dinner and be back at ICPC by 6:30pm.
It is common knowledge that the most egregious affronts to human dignity, life and liberty have been dressed up as ‘protocols’ or ‘rules’, when they are nothing but the thinnest veneers of legality, unlawfully deployed in a most brazen assault on the rule of law. Mallam has been in custody for over 90 days now and has been charged, in multiple courts in Kaduna State and the FCT, with offences that are unquestionably bailable.
Our immediate focus is on securing Mallam’s freedom. While Mallam remains in custody, we urge the ICPC to respect his rights, obey court orders and stop deploying ‘protocols’ as instruments for magnifying the inconveniences of detention. Our family cannot be expected to meekly accept the violation of the rights of Mallam Nasir El-Rufai.
Signed on behalf of the family.
Hon. Mohammed Bello El-Rufai
Member.
Kaduna North Federal Constituency
Chairman, Committee on Banking Regulations.
May 19, 2026.