Court Views Shock TV Video of El-Rufai Admitting to Intercepting NSA Nuhu Ribadu’s Private Phone Conversations

The treason and cybercrime trial of former Kaduna State Governor Nasir El-Rufai has taken a dramatic turn after a federal court viewed broadcast footage and heard testimonies confirming the politician openly admitted to intercepting the private telephone conversations of the National Security Adviser, Nuhu Ribadu.

The explosive courtroom details unzipped on Monday, June 22, 2026, before Justice Joyce Abdulmalik of the Federal High Court in Abuja. The high-profile prosecution stands as the most critical national security trial on the 2026 legal calendar, arriving precisely as federal intelligence units tighten surveillance grids across subnational borders to protect top-tier state actors from cyber espionage and unauthorized data breaches.

Taking the witness stand as the second prosecution witness for the Department of State Services (DSS), prominent Abuja-based lawyer and rights activist Deji Adeyanju provided a firsthand tracking log of the events.

Adeyanju, who was subpoenaed by the state, revealed that he was physically present at the studio of Arise Television in Abuja on February 16, 2026, waiting for his own media segment when El-Rufai appeared as a live guest on the station’s flagship Prime Time program.

Led in evidence by the lead prosecutor, Oluwole Aladedoye (SAN), the witness verified that the former governor willingly unzipped confidential operational files on national television.

According to the official court transcript, El-Rufai explicitly declared on air, “We listened to the conversations of the NSA.” Adeyanju further testified that when the television anchor pushed the politician to clarify the technical logistics behind the security breach, El-Rufai admitted that an external tech operator had executed the wiretapping manual before forwarding the intercepted conversation logs to his camp.

Following the verbal testimony, the courtroom went completely silent as the prosecution initialized its digital evidence files, playing the full Arise TV interview video clip on open monitors. The court subsequently admitted the video-loaded flash drive and Adeyanju’s formal statements as certified exhibits.

During a fierce cross-examination by the lead defense counsel, Paul Erokoro (SAN), the defense attempted to puncture the text of the accusation, extracting an admission from the witness that El-Rufai did not explicitly use the technical word “hack” on camera.

“Under cross-examination, I made it completely clear that while I did not hear him say he personally hacked the lines, I heard him say verbatim: ‘We listened to the conversations of the NSA,'” Deji Adeyanju unzipped within a post-hearing brief on his digital media handles. “When the defense asked if I knew the specific telecommunication channels or devices the NSA uses to execute his daily state scripts, or if I was aware that the DSS investigators didn’t perform a forensic audit on the NSA’s physical phones, I told them flatly that those technical parameters are not my business. My singular job as a subpoenaed witness was to confirm the absolute authenticity of the statement the defendant unzipped on national television, and that has been done.”

The legal battle lines shifted rapidly during the follow-up hearing on Tuesday morning, June 23, 2026, when the prosecution abruptly announced the formal closure of its case after calling its key witnesses and submitting its electronic data sheets.

Unfazed by the swift closure, El-Rufai’s legal defense team immediately initialized a counter-defensive script. Erokoro informed the court that the former governor intends to file a comprehensive no-case submission, arguing that the state’s entire narrative relies on a highly misinterpreted media interview rather than concrete forensic proof of cyber infiltration.

Concurrently, the defense team launched an aggressive bid to vary the stringent conditions of the ₦100 million bail earlier granted to the former governor—which requires Level 17 civil servants with verified property holdings in Maitama or Asokoro to stand as sureties—claiming the current parameters function as a soft detention manual. Justice Abdulmalik flatly rejected the application, maintaining that qualified public officers meeting those criteria are fully available within the capital city.

With the court officially adjourning further proceedings until September 22, 2026, to allow both legal syndicates to file and exchange their written addresses on the no-case submission, the high-stakes wiretapping scandal has permanently disrupted the country’s political calculation fields.