The Guild of Professional Bloggers of Nigeria (GPBN), the umbrella group of bloggers in the country, has condemned the arrest of an Abuja-based blogger, Mr Abubakar Sidiq Usman, by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).

GPBN in a statement signed by its Acting President, Chris Kehinde Nwandu, asked the anti-graft agency to immediately release the blogger.

It queried the action of the commission “which is usurping the functions of the police.”

According to the body, the appropriate action to be taken by the agency if aggrieved is to report the matter to the police, which would then carry out an investigation.

“The accused would be made to write down his statement and if found culpable charged to court to defend his action,” GPBN said in the statement issued this morning in Abuja.

It condemned the manner in which EFCC arrested the blogger as condemnable, saying that “it does not follow global practice.”

The union disclosed that it has set up an ethics committee to handle issues like the one involving Usman. It requested “any aggrieved person or organisation to take full advantage of the ethics committee of the union to address critical issues of this nature.”

GPBN, therefore, called on the anti-graft agency “to focus its attention on its core mandate which is financial and other economic related offences.”

News Express reports that Usman, publisher of www.abusidiqu.com, was picked up at his Kubwa, Abuja, home in the early hours of Monday by EFCC operatives and detained for alleged cyber stalking, which the agency said contravenes sections of the Cyber Crime Act.

•Photo shows detained blogger Abubakar Sidiq Usman.

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