Four officials and workers associated with Royal Anchor Estate have been discharged after a Senior Magistrate Court in Karu dismissed a criminal case brought against them by Abolarinwa Olatunbosun.
 
The matter, CR/124/24, came to an end after the court upheld the defence’s objection to a further adjournment, with the prosecution having been unable to proceed after the complainant’s absence from consecutive proceedings.
 
The defendants were identified as Henry Ortese, Attahiru Musa, Tanko Yakubu Pani and Abraham Osezuah.
 
Defence counsel, Joe Abah, had urged the court to dismiss the case, arguing that the complainant had not demonstrated the level of commitment required to sustain the prosecution.
 
Counsel holding brief for Olatunbosun’s substantive lawyer, D.D. Aaka, had sought another adjournment. She told the court that the case was due for further cross-examination of the first prosecution witness, but that Aaka was engaged in another matter at Court 44 in Kuje.

She also informed the court that the complainant was out of the country and expected to return at the end of June.
 
The defence opposed the application, recalling that the matter had been adjourned several times.
 
Abah said the parties were last before the court on December 15, 2025, when the case was adjourned to February. The court did not sit on February 11, 2026, and another date, April 23, was subsequently fixed. The court again did not sit on that date.
 
The case was later adjourned to May 14, when the complainant was again absent.
 
Abah argued that the complainant ought to have taken steps to ascertain the hearing date and drew the court’s attention to Section 351 of the ACJA 2015.
 
In its ruling, the court considered the circumstances surrounding the repeated adjournments and the provisions of Section 351 concerning the absence of a complainant.
 
Presiding senior magistrate Punarinam Babatunde Balogun noted that the court’s discretion to grant adjournments must be exercised judicially and judiciously.
 
The court further observed that the complainant’s counsel could have written to the court to explain the absence of both the complainant and the substantive lawyer. Such an explanation, the court held, could have provided the basis for protection under Section 351(2) of the ACJA.
 
The court therefore dismissed the criminal case and discharged the defendants.