Tinubu, opposition leader docked

Bola Ahmed Tinubu, former Lagos State Governor, docked

Tinubu, opposition leader docked

One of the opposition leaders in Nigeria and former governor of Lagos state, in south west of the nation has been arraigned before the Code of Conduct Tribunal in Abuja, the nation’s capital on a three count charge of perjury.

The leader of Action Congress of Nigeria, ACN, Bola Tinubu, was alleged to have operated 10 foreign accounts while in office between 1999 and 2007.

Specifically, he was accused of violating Section 7 of the Code of Conduct Bureau and Tribunal Act, Cap C15 LFN, 2004 as amended, by operating the said accounts, an offence punishable under Section 23(2) thereof as incorporated under paragraph 18, part 1, 5th Schedule to the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

Tinubu however declined to enter his plea to any of the allegations levelled against him contending that he would need time to go through the charges served on his legal team right inside the court.

Protest

The lead counsel to Tinubu, Wole Olanipekun, SAN, while asking for an adjournment of the case, protested against the procedure adopted by the prosecution in summoning his client to court.

He maintained that the decision of his client to appear before the three-man panel of justices at the tribunal was due to the utmost respect his client has for the judiciary.

He said:”My Lords, the defendant is before this tribunal out of utmost respect to the institution of the judiciary. All of us appreciate the fact that service of any court process is fundamental. It is however regrettable that no personal service was effected on him, a copy of the charge was dropped somewhere and he heard of it which he cannot deny. But out of respect and the nature of the matter he showed up before this court voluntarily. Though we promise to give our cooperation within the ambit of the law and as permitted by the ethics of the profession, we however plead that henceforth, all processes should be served on us personally and not on the pages of newspapers. We don’t want it to be construed that the defendant refused to answer to the queries against him.”

However, the prosecuting counsel, Alex Iziyon, SAN, while conceding that the court process was not properly served on the defendant, justified the action.

According to him:”For the bailiff of this tribunal to see the accused person face to face to serve him the court process was not an easy thing.”

Though the defence counsel drew the attention of the court to the fact that they were served with the new charge on Wednesday, Olanipekun stressed that they came to court with a view to challenging the previous charge which he said was grossly defective and incompetent.

He told the tribunal that they had filed a motion challenging the charge, asking that it should be quashed forthwith.

Defective charge

Barely two minutes after the CCT chairman, Justice Danladi Umar, who presided over the case alongside Justice Atedze Agwadza and Justice Robert Udo, (rtd), admitted the fresh charge, another drama ensued following insistence on the part of the prosecution that the charge be read to the accused person for his plea to be taken.

He dismissed the contention of the defence counsel that once an objection is raised against the jurisdiction of a court to entertain a matter, plea taken ought to be kept in abeyance pending when the objection is determined.

Olanipekun, who had argued that the charges were defective, relied on the provisions of Section 167 of the Criminal Procedure Act, CPA, to insist that it was not right for an accused to plead to such a defective charge.

“Plea is part of the defence of an accused person, he has not even seen or read the new charge against him, is he then expected to plead to what he doesn’t know?” he asked.

Despite the contention of the counsel for the prosecution that the Criminal Procedure Code, CPC, was the statute applicable in the Federal Capital Territory, which he said permitted an accused to enter his plea regardless of any preliminary objection against the substantive suit, the tribunal, however, overruled him on the grounds that the tenets of fair-hearing entails that an accused ought to be granted adequate facility to prepare his defence.

In his ruling, Justice Umar held that: “We will have to look at this case generally and we have to do justice to both the prosecution and the accused person. It is important that we grant the defendant the necessary time to file the objection then we can look at it to see if it is sustainable, if it is not, then we can proceed. However, I want to inform everyone that this is not a regular court where several frivolous motions are filed to stall trial. This matter must be dealt with summarily, speedily and expeditiously. Having said that, this case is hereby adjourned till October 26.”

The tribunal further ordered the complainant to file its written address within 14 days from yesterday while it gave the defendant five days to file a reply on points of law.

NP/Ehimen/Qasim