The Lead Partner of an Abuja-based law firm, Law Corridor, Kelechukwu Eni-Otu, has urged the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission to end the Gestapo raids that its operatives became accustomed to under the leadership of its suspended chairman, Abdulrasheed Bawa.

He made this known while commending the recent decision of the new EFCC chairman, Ola Olukoyede, to ban sting operations by EFCC operatives at night.

Bawa, who assumed office on February 24, 2021, was controversially removed on June 14, 2023 and put in the custody of the Department of State Services for 134 days before his recent release.

The law firm, in a statement on Saturday, charged the new EFCC boss, who was appointed and confirmed last month not to toe the path of his predecessor, Bawa, whose tenure as EFCC boss witnessed abuse of human rights through reckless midnight Gestapo raids on hotels and homes of innocent citizens.

The law firm also knocked the EFCC for alleged lack of due diligence in the unlawful arrest of some students of the Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Osun State, who were wrongly labelled as suspected internet fraudsters.

The law firm said, “The ban of midnight raids by the new EFCC boss is a welcome development. This has been our cries and that of many civil rights advocates for years. However, the ban on midnight stings by the new EFCC chair must be sustained beyond mere rhetorics to sanitise the EFCC and set the anti-graft agency on the right path.

“The Bawa days must not be allowed to return under any guise. Truth be told, the Gestapo style of EFCC operatives and their high-handedness under Bawa was unprecedented and crudely undemocratic.

“This led to the loss of lives of innocent Nigerians and sheer embarrassment of many who were falsely labelled fraudsters and whose residences were invaded in a commando style without search warrant.

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