A High Court sitting in Warri, Delta State on Monday fined a former minister of state for education Kenneth Gbagi N1 million for dehumanising some staff of his hotel.
Justice Vera Agbodje ruled that the governorship candidate of Social Democratic Party (SDP) in Delta violated the fundamental human rights of Victor Ephraim and others.
Mr Ephraim filed the suit against Gbagi and his hotel, Signatious Hotel and Suites Limited.
Ephraim said that between September 17 and 18, 2020, Gbagi used the mobile policemen attached to him to forcefully strip him naked.
Also, he explained that he was kept inside the booth of Gbagi’s car, tortured and dehumanised alongside three female staff of the hotel.
According to him, the female staff were also stripped naked and paraded publicly on the allegation that they failed to remit money paid by a guest of the hotel.
He added that Gbagi collected their ATM cards and transferred all the money in their bank accounts to the hotel’s account.
Consequently, Justice Agbodje ruled that Gbagi took laws into his own hands by torturing his ex-staff.
Gbagi said in a statement that the judgment was a ploy by the Okowa administration to demarket him.
“We have entered an appeal to set aside the ‘paid junk judgment’ for a competent Court and the National Judicial Council to do justice to the procedure.
“I urge my teeming growing supporters to ignore this Okowa’s paid judgment. You can not demarket what God has marketed,” Gbagi said.
