However, hours later, the Rivers State chapter of the APC said the lawyers have been released following the public outrage that trailed the action of the police.
The spokesperson of the APC in Rivers State, Darlington Nwauju, confirmed that “the lawyers were granted bail on self-recognition while members of the support staff were granted conditional bail.”
The arrested persons were three lawyers and five support staff.
He, however, alleged that the election documents and the laptops with which the lawyers were working were still being detained at press time.
The APC governorship candidate in the state, Mr. Tonye Cole, has sent a Save Our Soul (SOS) message to President Muhammadu Buhari regarding the arrest of evidence of electoral fraud in the state.
In the message, Cole said: “Today in the morning hours the police in Rivers State arrested three lawyers that are standing for APC in Rivers State with regards to the just-concluded governorship election.
“Just this night after much effort by the leaders of the party, the police released the three lawyers but are still withholding all the electoral documents collected from the lawyers.”
As at press time, Cole was still at the State CID headquarters.
He vowed not to leave the facility until the documents are released.
While the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) has vowed to take legal action against the police officers who arrested the lawyers, a human rights activist, Mr. Femi Falana (SAN) has also condemned the action of the police officers, whose motive was to prevent the lawyers from appearing before the election tribunal on Monday.
