By Wandoo Sombo
A lawyer, Mr Inibehe Effiong, has urged the Federal Government to pursue diplomatic solutions over alleged profiling, wrongful arrest and prolonged detention of a Nigerian, Mr Gideon Ezeh, by Qatari authorities.
Effiong made the call on Friday at a news briefing in Abuja, where Ezeh narrated his experience at the Hamad International Airport, Doha, during a transit stop on May 7, 2025.
Ezeh said that while travelling to the United States on a Qatar Airways flight, he was stopped during a routine security check over a mannequin head found in his carry-on luggage.
He said that officials dismantled and discovered Styrofoam and white stones inside the mannequin which the officials believed were cocaine stones.
According to him, the items were packaging materials from a supermarket purchase in Nigeria, adding that multiple tests, including chemical swabs and machine analysis, returned negative results for narcotics.
In spite of the negative results, he said Qatari officials detained him, seized his passport and phone, conducted repeated searches, and transferred him in handcuffs to a detention facility in Duhaill.
“I was handcuffed behind my back, driven in a black vehicle to the detention centre under the pretext of final test and that it will take only two hours.
“At the detention centre, I was stripped completely naked, ordered to jump, squat, and cough, while a device was passed around my genitals and anus. Again, nothing incriminating was found on me.
“I was detained and compelled to sign a report written entirely in Arabic, which falsely declared the harmless stones were cocaine stones.”
He said that was how he spent six weeks in detention adding that he later learned through the Nigerian Embassy in Qatar, they had sent the stones for forensic lab analyses during his detention.
“The analyses surprisingly took six weeks, after which the results came out, still showing the stones were benign and non-narcotics.
“ I was ultimately released from custody without any charge or conviction on June 19, 2025, confirming the complete lack of evidence or legal basis for the original accusation and detention,’’ he said.
Ezeh said the incident led to the revocation of his U.S. visa on May 12, 2025, as well as his wife’s dependent student visa, thereby threatening her ongoing Ph.D. programme in the United States.
He accused Qatari authorities of refusing to release forensic laboratory reports in spite of repeated requests made personally and through the Nigerian Embassy in Qatar.
“In the days following my release, I discovered that my U.S. visa was revoked on May 12.
“This was an aftermath of the wrongful airport arrest and since I had obtained my U.S. visa as my wife’s dependent, her student visa also got revoked in relation to the case.
“This even came at a time when she was preparing for her Ph.D. candidacy examination, adding more fuel to the fire already ravaging our lives.
“The U.S. visa revocation alluded to me, resulted from Doha Airport report that cited that the stones inside the mannequin were “cocaine stones”.
“I became aware of this report due to a document that I was issued following my release, that served as an identification document for collection of my belongings from the Qatar Drugs Prosecution Department,’’ he said.
The lawyer called on the Federal Government to engage Qatari authorities diplomatically, demand a retraction of what he described as false allegations.
He also urged the government to impress on the Qatari authorities to write to the United States telling them his client had no drugs on him so that his visa and that of his wife could be restored.
He is also seeking redress for the damage caused to his client and his family.
