The Department of State Services (DSS) on Friday clarified the circumstances surrounding the reported seizure of former Kaduna State Governor Nasir El-Rufai’s passport at the Nnamdi Azikiwe International Airport, Abuja.
The clarification followed claims by El-Rufai’s media aide, Muyiwa Adekeye, who alleged on his verified X handle that security agents attempted to arrest the former governor upon his arrival from Cairo, Egypt.
Adekeye wrote:
“Security agents today attempted to arrest Malam Nasir El-Rufai as he arrived on a flight from Cairo. Malam El-Rufai declined to follow them without a formal invitation.”
He further alleged that operatives seized the former governor’s passport during the encounter.
However, a DSS source dismissed the arrest claim as false, insisting that the action taken was limited to the seizure of El-Rufai’s passport in compliance with a request from an anti-graft agency.
“We only seized his passport in response to a request by an anti-graft agency, so he would honour their invitation. There was no attempt to arrest or detain him,” the DSS source explained.
The incident comes amid heightened political tension, with El-Rufai recently defecting from the All Progressives Congress (APC) to the African Democratic Congress (ADC). He has repeatedly suggested that he could be targeted by the Federal Government, citing the arrest of four of his associates.
Speaking to the BBC Hausa Service earlier, El-Rufai said:
“Four people we worked with in Kaduna have been arrested; so it is only a matter of time before they come for me too.”
He alleged that political pressure was being exerted on opposition figures to either defect to the APC or remain within the ruling party, describing the current climate as one of intimidation.
