The lead counsel of the defense team representing Morris Mabior Awikjok Bak, an activist and government critic, on Wednesday demanded that the Director General of the National Security Service’s (NSS) Internal Security Bureau (ISB), Gen. Akol Koor, appear in court in person.
The activist is battling a defamation case in court brought by the security chief.
Mabior, a former refugee in Kenya, was abducted on 4 February 2023 in Nairobi and returned to South Sudan where he has since been detained by the NSS which refused to acknowledge that they were holding him until he was suddenly produced in court in April.
During the hearing presided by Arkangelo Ladu, a First Grade Magistrate at the Juba County Court, Senior Advocate Kiir Chol Deng rejected a representative of the NSS boss and demanded that Gen. Koor appear in person.
Chol told Radio Tamazuj after the court session that they also want the presiding judge, Arkanjelo Ladu, to recuse himself from hearing the case, accusing him of being biased.
“We objected to the presiding judge because he seems biased in favor of the complainant so we asked him to recuse himself from handling the case but he refused to recuse himself although we have good grounds for that,” he explained. “The judge lied to us on 24 April that the accused is on bail but during the cross-examination with the police investigator, the police confirmed that the accused is not out on bail and is still in detention. Secondly, he is not allowing us to read the file so that we prepare our defense.”
Chol said they want Gen. Koor to appear in court so that they can question him about the defamation case and not his representative.
“We also objected to a certain guy called David Philip Loi because, today, we were expecting the Director General of the Internal Security Bureau, Gen. Akol Koor, who is the complainant in this matter. We were expecting him to appear today before court so that we could hear his statement but he did not attend,” Chol stated. “He authorized a certain David Philip Loi to represent him and as such we rejected or opposed that agent because we need Gen. Akol himself to come to court because you cannot come to court and then go and authorize another person to come and speak on your behalf.”
He added: “We need him (Koor) in person so that we question him about certain acts or violations committed by the National Security Service during his administration.”
The senior advocate further revealed that they objected to the power of authority that was given by Gen. Koor to Loi.
“When you object to such a document, then you suspend the trial in the main case. So, the main case has now been suspended and it opened a new case to conduct trial within trial to establish whether that power of attorney given by Akol Koor was genuine or forged,” he clarified. “We are opposing the agent, the representative of Akol Koor, and saying let Koor come by himself to court and explain. This is because we need to question him on several issues including the way he has been administering the institution since his appointment.”
Chol also said that they applied for his client to be released on bail and are awaiting the court’s response.
“We filed an application to release the accused on bail because he has been detained for almost 20 months at the NSS and despite the charge of criminal defamation, you can be released on bail and continue attending court sessions,” he asserted. “So, we have asked the judge to release the accused on bail and the ruling on that will be on 23 July. On the same day, we are also expecting the court to start hearing us on why we rejected the representative of Gen. Koor and want him to appear in person.”