The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, on Friday, April 22, 2016 presented its fifth witness in the ongoing trial of a former governor of Adamawa State, Murtala Nyako, his son, Senator Abdul-Aziz Nyako, Abubakar Aliyu and Zulkifikk Abba.
Nyako and the others are standing trial before Justice E. Chukwu of
the Federal High Court, Abuja in a 37-count charge bordering on criminal
conspiracy, stealing, abuse of office and money laundering to the tune
of N29 billion preferred against them by the Economic and Financial
Crimes Commission, EFCC.
They are alleged to have at various times between 2011 and 2013, used
five companies – Blue Opal Nigeria limited, Serore Farms &
Extension Limited, Pagoda Fortunes Limited, Towers Assets Management
Limited and Crust Energy Limited to commit the fraud.
The prosecution through its counsel, Adebisi Adeniyi and Leke
Atolagbe, sought to present more exhibits against the defendants through
the witness, Celestine Idiaye, Cluster Control Manager, Internal
Control Unit, of Diamond Bank, Garki branch, Abuja.
Idiaye, who was led in evidence by Atolagbe, told the court that the
bank received a letter from the EFCC dated September 23, 2014 requesting
for account opening documents and statement of account in respect of
Sentinel Exploration and Production Limited, a company linked to Nyako.
“We responded with a letter dated September 30, 2014 and provided two
statements of account, account opening documents and certificate of
identification,” he said.
He added that at the time of producing the said documents, the bank’s
computer systems “were in perfect condition and we compared them with
what we have in our database and they were the same”.
The forwarding letter from the bank to which was attached the various
documents, were presented in court, and were identified by Idiaye as
the documents from Diamond Bank forwarded to the EFCC.
However, Y. C. Maikyau, SAN, counsel to Abubakar Aliyu, questioned the admissibility of the documents by the court.
He told the court that while he had “no objection to the forwarding
letter, the documents attached, which include photocopies were by their
nature public documents that needed to be certified by the public
officer who has custody of the original copies”. He argued that the
photocopy of the international passport in the document ought to have
been certified by an official of the Nigeria Immigration Service, NIS,
and the photocopy of the certificate of incorporation of the company
ought to have been certified by an official of the Corporate Affairs
Commission, CAC.
“The requirements for certifying a pubic document according to
Section 104 of the Evidence Act 2011 was not met as it relates to the
cited documents,” Maikyau argued.
Ibrahim Isiyaku, SAN, counsel to the fourth and eight defendants,
Olumide Olujimi, counsel to the fifth defendant, and O. A. Dada, counsel
to the ninth defendant, all aligned themselves with the argument of
Maikyau.
Responding, Adeniyi, argued that the points canvassed by the defence
team was misplaced. “The position of the law is that documents attached
to the letter, which has not been opposed to by the defence, must be
admitted as a whole,” he said.
According to Adeniyi, “what we sought to tender through the witness
was the letter sent to the EFCC from Diamond Bank, which has not been
opposed to by the defence”.
He added that: “What we have before your lordship is a statement of
account and we’re not in an era of ledger, and a statement of account is
in its original form that was printed from the computer server.”
He, therefore, urged the court to “discountenance the objection and
reject the attempt to sever the attached documents from the letter,
which ought to be admitted as a whole”.
After listening to all the arguments, Justice Chukwu, thereafter
adjourned till May 6, 2016 for ruling on the admissibility of the
documents and continuation of trial.
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