Nigerian Court Gives Go-Ahead for Arrest of Party Boss

An Abuja High Court, sitting in Maitama, yesterday, gave the Federal Government, suo motu, the green light to apply for a warrant to arrest the incumbent Chairman of the Peoples’ Democratic Party, PDP, Prince Vincent Ogbulafor and five others, for trial over alleged illegal diversion of N2.3billion belonging to the Federal Government.

The court said the Federal Government could explore the option if it suspected that Ogbulafor and his accomplices were attempting to either abscond or scuttle their arraignment already fixed for May 3, this year.

This was even as Vanguard gathered that Ogbulafor’s lawyer, J. D. Gadzama, SAN, has secured and served a court warrant preventing the police headquarters from arresting the PDP chairman.

The go-ahead to apply for a warrant of arrest came on a day the trial high court judge, Justice Ishaq Bello, formally okayed all the accused persons for trial based on the 16-count charge preferred against them by the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission, ICPC.

The four others dragged to court, include a former secretary and member of the National Economic Intelligence Committee, NEIC, Mr. Emeka Ebilah, former Director, Budget Implementation, Federal Ministry of Finance, Mr. Emmanuel C. Bosah, Jude Nwokoro and Henry Ikoh. Although the schedule of the court was not the arraignment of the accused persons, Ogbulafor and Henry Ikoh had already hired lawyers to formally announce appearances for them.

Ogbulafor alone hired four reputable law firms of Senior Advocates of Nigeria, SAN, namely: Chief J. K. Gadzama, SAN, Paul Erokoro, SAN, Amechi Nwaiwu, SAN, and Chukwuma Ekomaro, SAN. He mandated them to file an application to scuttle the legal move before it got to the level of docking them for the purposes of taking their pleas.

Source: Allafrica

 

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