Daily Trust
23 Feb 2011
The House of Representatives yesterday passed into law the Anti-Terrorism bill, a week after the Senate passed its own version of the legislation.
In the bill, the House grants powers to the State Security Service (SSS) to search houses of private persons on the “suspicion or allegation” of terrorism act without obtaining any warrant from a court of law.
The MPs passed clause 23 of the bill which states that, “a search in houses of people can be made without warrant” amidst protest led by Rep Abdul Ahmed Ningi who argued that there was no place in the world where security officials were given powers to search anybody without warrant.
He said “no matter how passionate we are about tackling terrorism we must not compromise human rights. A judge must issue a warrant. We must play above the board because this clause is in contradiction with provisions of the 1999 constitution.”
The MP cautioned his colleagues about using the said clause by government in power to witch-hunt its political opponents.
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