Court adjourns trial of NIMASA ex-boss, Akpobolokemi

EFCC denies report on judge

A Federal High Court in Lagos yesterday fixed April 18 for continuation of trial of former NIMASA boss, Patrick Akpobolokemi and five others, charged with N2.6 billion theft.

Justice Ibrahim Buba, who adjourned the case, which was earlier fixed for trial to the new date at the instance of the court, said the court was saddled with much workload and so, fixed continuation of trial on the next adjourned date.

In another development, the EFCC has denied being the source of the online medium, which recently published a report that Justice Abdul Kafarati had been bribed to rule in favour of Senate President, Dr. Bukola Saraki.

Justice Kafarati of the Federal High Court, Abuja, had according to media reports, declined ruling in the fundamental human rights enforcement case brought before him by Senate President Saraki on the grounds that an online news medium had alleged that he had been bribed to rule in Saraki’s favour.

A statement by EFCC spokesman, Wilson Uwujaren, said: “Justice Kafarati, according reports in ThisDay newspaper of March 23, 2016 claimed the online platform quoted the EFCC as the source of its information.

“Against this background, it has become necessary to state that the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) had no hand in the report which is entirely the imagination of the authors.

“All allusions to the commission’s investigation or documents in the said publication should be disregarded. At no time did the EFCC share intelligence or revealed the content of any dossier it may have on any judge for that matter with any media organisation either in Nigeria or abroad.

“The commission wishes to state for the umpteenth time that it believes in the rule of law and will not take extra-legal measures to ridicule or embarrass any member of the public that may or may not be under investigation. The court is the final arbiter in cases of corruption. What the law expects of the commission, which it has been doing, is to charge people investigated and indicted of any offence under the relevant laws to court. There is no other way.”