The eight-year-old trial of a former governor of Oyo State, Rashidi Ladoja, for an alleged fraud of N4.7bn, was stalled on Tuesday due to lack of preparation by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission.
The case, which was filed against Ladoja since 2009, had been scheduled to start afresh on Tuesday before Justice Mohammed Idris of the Federal High Court in Lagos.
But the case failed to proceed as the prosecution failed to frontload the statement of its first witness.
Though Ladoja and his co-defendant, Waheed Akanbi, were in court with their lawyers, Justice Idris was compelled to further adjourn the case at the request of the prosecution, which sought for more time to put its house in order.
The judge also vacated Wednesday (today) and Thursday, which had also been assigned to the case in compliance with the day-to-day provision of the Administration of Criminal Justice Act.
When the case was called on Tuesday, the prosecuting counsel for the EFCC, Mr. Oluwafemi Olabisi, from the chambers of Mr. Festus Keyamo, told Justice Idris that the matter was slated for trial and he was ready to proceed.
He, thereafter, called his first witness, Mr. Abdullahi Lawal, a police officer attached to the EFCC as an investigator.
Lawal was put on oath and was about to commence his testimony when Ladoja’s lawyer, Mr. Bolaji Onilenla, rose and raised an objection to Lawal’s competence to testify in the case.
Onilenla said, “With the greatest respect, My Lord, we have an issue here. The name of the gentleman in the witness box did not appear on the list of witnesses given to us contrary to the provisions of Section 379 (1) of the ACJA, which mandates the prosecution to make available to the defendants the documents itemised therein in particular Paragraph A(2). Because of this, we are of the view that we have been caught by surprise.”
Counsel for Akanbi, Mr. Adeyinka Olumide-Fusika, aligned himself with Onilenla, contending that Lawal could not testify until his statement had been frontloaded.
In response, Olabisi admitted the error and urged the judge to give him time to do the needful.
The defence counsel, however, changed their minds and said they did not mind for the witness to continue despite that his statement was not frontloaded.
Olumide-Fusika noted that the case had taken so long and should not be further delayed, nothing that he had already collected his full legal fee years ago and had since spent it.
But Justice Idris said since all the counsel had agreed that the failure to frontload Lawal’s statement was a breach of Section 379(1) of the ACJA, it would be better to adjourn to allow the prosecution to comply with the law.
He noted that he had in several other cases upheld that position and he was unwilling to deviate, more so as the case might go to the Court of Appeal.
“We will work with speed but in accordance with the law. I will not accept that we operate outside the law,” the judge said.
He consequently adjourned the case till March 1, 2017 for the prosecution to do the needful.
Ladoja and Akanbi were re-arraigned on eight counts before Justice Idris on December 14, 2016.
Their re-arraignment came eight years after they were first arraigned before Justice A.R. Mohammed in 2009.
After their arraignment in 2009, they had challenged the competence of the charges all the way to the Supreme Court over a period of seven years.
But the Supreme Court last year struck out the appeal on the grounds that it was incompetent.
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