Human rights activist and lawyer Dele Farotimi has stated that despite the withdrawal of criminal charges against him, his legal struggles are far from over.
He revealed that he is still considering his options following his 21-day detention and the lawsuits he continues to face.
Speaking on The Duke Rants podcast, which was uploaded to YouTube over the weekend, Farotimi was asked how he would react if he met legal luminary Chief Afe Babalola today.
He responded: “Like a good Yoruba boy, I’ll give him his salutations. It doesn’t change the fact that I’m still considering my options as regards what to do about what I went through.”
When asked to clarify what options he was exploring, he stated: “Oh, all the areas of options that are open to a person who was unlawfully kidnapped from his office, hauled before a magistrate for a non-existent crime.”
Farotimi also recalled the events leading to his arrest, stressing that legal procedures were ignored.
“Policemen crossed five state lines, entered a sixth state — from Ekiti to Ondo, to Osun, to Oyo, to Ogun, and then crossed into Lagos. Somebody has to explain the basis of my incarceration for 21 days,” he added.
His legal troubles began after Chief Afe Babalola petitioned the Ekiti State Commissioner of Police, accusing Farotimi of defamation in his book, Nigeria and Its Criminal Justice System. Following his arrest, he was arraigned before an Ekiti State Magistrate Court on charges of criminal defamation and before the Federal High Court in Ado Ekiti for alleged cyber-bullying.
Despite Babalola’s withdrawal of the petition on January 27, after interventions by the Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Ogunwusi, and other traditional rulers, Farotimi disclosed that he still faces four separate lawsuits filed by members of Babalola’s law office across different states.
“My inability to speak to certain aspects of this issue is borne out of the fact that, despite the discontinuation of the criminal proceeding, I still have four suits that I am aware of, in four different states of the federation, filed by members of the same law office, against my person,” he said.
Farotimi firmly defended his book, insisting that it was based on research and personal experience rather than falsehoods.
“I did not sit down in a beer parlour; I was not at an officers’ mess; I was not gossiping. It was not idle, cheap talk. I wrote a book.
“Let us deal with veracity. Anybody can go and read and then come back and challenge me with the lie that I have told,” he stated.
He dismissed suggestions that the controversy was about his personal reputation, explaining that the real issue at stake was Nigeria’s legal system.
“This is not a trial of Dele Farotimi. Let nobody make that error. It is a trial of the legal system that we have built as a collective,” he asserted.
Farotimi also noted that his book was never meant to be a personal attack on Babalola or any individual but rather a critique of corruption within the judiciary.
“Chief Afe Babalola is more than old enough to be my father,” he said. “I did not set out to destroy the man or to tarnish his image. Nothing personal. I was writing about the institution of the judiciary.”
