The Kogi State High Court sitting in Lokoja on Friday granted an interim order for Senator Dino Melaye representing Kogi West be moved to the National Hospital, Abuja.
That was 24 hours after a Senior Magistrate Court in Lokoja denied him bail and ruled that he be remanded in police custody for 39 days.
He had been stretchered before Senior Magistrate Suleiman Abdulahi and charged with supplying illegal arms to two suspects with a view to committing various crimes in the state.
In Abuja on Wednesday, the embattled senator was charged with causing damage to government property, attempted suicide and escape from lawful custody.
The Chief Justice of Kogi State, Justice Nasir Ajanah, said the order on Melaye’s transfer to the National Hospital, Abuja, was on account of accused person’s critical health conditions as espoused by his counsel, Mike Ozekhome (SAN).
Mr Ozekhome said Melaye is a chronic asthmatic patient who gasped for breath on Thursday while being arraigned and had to be given his inhaler in the courtroom and in the presence of Senior Magistrate Abdulahi.
The high court adjourned till Monday for continuation of hearing in a written bail application filled by Ozekhome in which he is asking for variation of the remand order placed on Melaye.
Soon after his arraignment in Lokoja on Thursday, Melaye was moved to the Police Clinic, New Layout, Lokoja.
Ozekhome and other counsel for Melaye drove in a Mercedes Benz 500 on the trail of the ambulance that took the accused from the magistrate court to the clinic on Thursday.
However, unlike last week when Melaye’s fellow senators rushed to pay him a solidarity visit at the National Hospital, Abuja, none had shown up yesterday in Lokoja to see him.
Melaye had protested being arraigned anywhere in Kogi, saying his life would not be safe.
He was charged along with two others, Kabiru Seidu (31) and Nuhu Salihu (25), before the Senior Magistrate Court 2, Lokoja.
They were arraigned on a seven-count charge of criminal conspiracy and unlawful possession of firearms, contrary to Section 97 (1) of the Penal Code and Section 27 (1) (a) (1) of the Firearms Act CAP P28, Laws of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 2004.
- The Nation
