The State Security Service (SSS) has approached the Federal High Court in Abuja seeking an order to bar Professor Pat Utomi from making public comments or organizing activities related to his proposed “shadow government” initiative.
In a fresh application filed on Wednesday, the SSS urged the court to issue an interlocutory injunction restraining Utomi — the 2007 presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress (ADC) — from engaging in any form of public advocacy, protests, media appearances, or gatherings linked to the initiative, pending the resolution of a substantive suit against him.
According to the security agency, the application was prompted by reports indicating that Utomi, currently abroad, intends to return to Nigeria on June 6 and commence a series of public engagements including rallies, road shows, interviews, and lectures to promote his shadow cabinet plan.
The SSS, in its filing, specifically seeks “an order of interlocutory injunction, restraining the defendant/respondent (Utomi), his agents, privies, associates, servants, workers or any person acting through him from staging road shows, rallies, public lectures or any form of public gathering, newspaper publications, television programs, jingles or any other public enlightenment programme(s) aimed at sensitizing, instigating, propagating or in any way promoting the purported ‘shadow government/shadow cabinet’ or its objectives or goals with the view to establishing the said ‘shadow government’ pending the hearing and determination of this substantive suit.”
The suit underscores growing tensions between Utomi and security authorities over the legality and implications of his political agenda. The SSS maintains that the proposed shadow government may be destabilizing and potentially unconstitutional, though Utomi’s supporters have described it as a legitimate form of democratic oversight commonly practiced in parliamentary democracies.
The court has yet to set a date for hearing the application. As of press time, Utomi has not publicly responded to the latest legal move.
