The Special Assistant to the President on Prosecution, Mr. Okoi Obono-Obla, has written to the Department of State Services (DSS) and the Nigeria Police requesting the probe of one Bishop Eze Orieke for allegedly spreading rumours of the death of President Muhammadu Buhari.

The Punch reports that in the acknowledgment copies of the separate letters, dated November 14, 2018, and addressed to the Director General of the DSS, Mr. Yusuf Bichi, and the Inspector-General of Police, Mr. Ibrahim Idris, Obono-Obla, specifically informed the heads of the security agencies in his petitions that Orieke made the false claim with purported documents from the London Bridge Hospital (Regional Medical Laboratory) to back it on the wall of a Facebook group called Ohafia Political Forum.

Copies of the documents, which were allegedly attached to the Facebook post and which Obono-Obla forwarded with his petitions to the security agencies, included a purported death certificate issued by the National Population Commission indicating that Buhari died of cardiac arrest in Abuja on September 19, 2017.

The letters read in part, “The said documents are attached herewith for your attention and consideration.

“It is a notorious fact and incontrovertible proof that his excellency, Muhammadu Buhari is not dead but very much alive and kicking.”

He added that the post on Facebook and the documents attached to it by the said Orieke “are fake and calculated to cause panic, disaffection and undermine national security.”

“It is ill-motivated, distasteful and made in extreme bad faith,” Obono-Obla said of the documents in his petitions.

“The act violated the provisions of section 24(1)(a),(b) and (2)(a),(b),(c)(i),(ii) of the Cybercrime (Prohibition & Prevention etc) Act, 2015.”

Offences under the said provision carry between three to 10 years imprisonment with or without fines ranging between N7m and N15m.

“In the light of the above, I respectfully urge you to investigate this matter,” Obono-Obla stated.