Filing Of Charges Against Oduah: Court Sends Police Lawyer To EFCC For Probe
For filing a criminal charge against Senator Stella Uduah, a Federal High Court sitting in Abuja on Tuesday, handed over a lawyer with the Nigeria Police Force, Ibrahim Mohammed to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) for proper investigation.
The police lawyer had filed an eight count of charges bothering on criminality against the former Minister of Aviation, Senator Oduah without the authority and approval of the EFCC.
The trial Judge, Justice James Omotosho asked Mohammed, who is believed to have left the EFCC in November 2022, if the anti-graft agency was in the know of the charges being prosecuted by the Police.
At this point, the police lawyer, admitted that he made errors in filing the controversial charges with the name of the anti-graft agency.
Justice Omotosho accordingly ordered that the genuineness of his errors should be determined and established through investigation.
Oduah was expected to have been arraigned before the court on the eight count charge bordering on alleged complicity surrounding her National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) certificate and fraudulently receiving money from the Federal Government.
When the case was called, the former Minister of Aviation was absent in court which made the trial Judge sought to know why she was not in court.
In his respond, Mohammed, who introduced himself as a lawyer with the Police Legal Department, Force Headquarters, Abuja, told the court that the defendant was not in court because she has not been served with the charge, adding that Oduah had told the police that she was ill.
It was at this point that the Court queried why the charge is coming in the name of EFCC when the prosecutor is from the Police.
Mohammed suddenly became incoherent in his response to questions from Justice Omotosho, saying that he left EFCC since November 2022 at Benin office for the Force Headquarters on redeployment and also admitted filing the charges on June 22 this year in the name of EFCC, seven months after, adding however that it was filed in error.
Justice Omotoso, who was not pleased with the claim of the police lawyer, ordered the Registrar of the Court to invite the head of police unit at the Federal High Court into the court room and thereafter ordered the head of the police team in the court to lead Mohammed to the EFCC headquarters and hand him over for investigation on the genuineness of the criminal charges.
Justice Omotosho therefore fixed further hearing in the matter for July 18, 2023 when the EFCC must have completed its investigation and report back to the court.
