The inability of former Accountant General of the Federation (AG-F), Ahmed Idris, to call a witness stalled Monday’s proceedings in his prosecution, along with three others, for alleged N109 billion fraud.

On Monday, Idris was expected to open his defense in the trial-within-trial, being conducted to determine the voluntariness of his extrajudicial statements.

The trial-within-trial was prompted by Idris’ claim that he was deceived by Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) operatives into admitting some of the allegations against him.

The prosecution has since closed its case in the trial-within-trial, during which it called witnesses, mostly EFCC officials who interrogated Idris and took statements from him.

The witnesses denied Idris’ claim that he was tricked into admitting some of the allegations and agreeing to cooperate with the investigators.

According to Idris’ lawyer, Kanayo Okafor, although the first defendant (Idris) was scheduled to open his defense in the trial-within-trial, it was not possible due to the unavailability of his witness.

Okafor stated that his client had planned to call a lawyer, Ituen Odudu Abasi, who witnessed the recording of some of Idris’ statements, but the proposed witness was bereaved and could not be in court.

He sought an adjournment, which was objected to by the prosecuting lawyer, Oluwaleke Atolagbe, who argued that it is the law for a defendant to act as his/her first witness in a trial-within-trial when they are to testify in the proceedings.

Atolagbe cited legal authorities and urged the court to direct the first defendant, who was present, to mount the witness box and testify as his first witness.

When questioned by Justice Yusuf Halilu about Atolagbe’s argument, Okafor responded that the defense team had not prepared Idris to testify as required.

He again requested the court to grant an adjournment to enable him to prepare his witness, which the judge granted, adjourning the case until March 11, 2025.

The EFCC is prosecuting Idris; his former Technical Assistant, Godfrey Olusegun Akindele; a director in the Office of the AG-F, Mohammed Kudu Usman; and Gezawa Commodity Market and Exchange Limited (allegedly owned by Idris) on a 14-count charge related to stealing and criminal breach of trust amounting to N109 billion.

The prosecution began the trial, but when tendering Idris’ statements, his lead lawyer, Chris Uche (SAN), objected to their admissibility, claiming that investigators misled his client into making statements containing admissions.

Uche insisted that the investigators promised Idris he would not be prosecuted, asserting that the statements were not made voluntarily, leading to the trial-within-trial.

While testifying for the prosecution in the trial-within-trial, one of the investigators, Mahmoud Tukur, denied Uche’s claim.