The Kogi State High Court sitting in Lokoja has granted bail to the lawmaker representing Kogi West, Senator Dino Melaye, in the sum of N10 million.

Justice Nasiru Ajanah granted Senator Melaye bail in his ruling on the application on Wednesday, based on the lawmaker’s health challenge.

The presiding judge described the medical report of the lawmaker as a merit factor to grant the bail application.

Weeks after being held in police custody, the judge, however, ordered Melaye to provide a surety in the like sum.

He also ordered that the international passport of the surety be domiciled with the court.

Senator Melaye is being charged by the police for allegedly arming deadly criminal gangs and convening a political rally that ended with the death of at least one attendee.

Earlier, the police said they had arrested suspects who confirmed that Mr Melaye had provided arms and financial support to them.

The lawmaker has since denied the allegations and pleaded not guilty to the charges levelled against him.

He had, however, claimed that his ordeal was mainly because of his outspoken stance against the alleged impunity of the state governor.

Senator Melaye was arrested in April after the police laid siege to his house in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory.

He consequently landed in the hospital after he sustained injuries, as the lawmaker was said to have jumped from a moving police vehicle which was conveying him to Kogi State where he was to be arraigned in court.

On May 3, the senator was arraigned on a stretcher by the police before the Magistrate Court in Lokoja over allegations of conspiracy and aiding of jailbreak.

At the last sitting on Thursday last week, Justice Ajanah fixed May 16 for the hearing on Senator Melaye’s bail application.

He adjourned the matter after listening to arguments from both the prosecuting counsel, Alex Iziyon, and the defence counsel, Mike Ozekhome. (Channels TV)

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