James Onanefe Ibori & Anor V. Federal Republic of Nigeria Ors (2008)

LawGlobal-Hub Lead Judgment Report

AMINA ADAMU AUGIE, J.C.A.

The Appellants and the three Respondents/Accused Persons, who are limited liability companies, were arraigned before the Federal High Court, Kaduna on the 13th of December, 2007. They pleaded not guilty to 103-count charges of corrupt enrichment, money laundering, etc., leveled against them. They later pleaded not guilty to 129-count Amended Charges on the 11th of January, 2008. After the 1st and 2nd Appellants were admitted to bail on the 11th of February, 2008, the lower Court adjourned the matter to the 18th of February, 2008, for hearing.

However, before the commencement of trial, the Appellants filed an application dated 18th February, 2008, praying for the following Orders-

“(1) An Order transferring this matter to the Chief Judge of the Federal High Court for onward transfer and assignment to the Judicial Division where the 129 counts in this Charge were allegedly committed on the ground continuing with the trial in Kaduna is;

(i) Contrary to the provisions of the Federal High Court,

(ii) Grossly violates the Applicants’ right to fair hearing, particularly the right and opportunity to adequately prepare their defence to the 129 counts made against them.

(iii) Kaduna is a forum non convenient chosen by the EFCC for reasons of forum shopping.

(2) An order that the presiding Judge Hon. M. L. Shuaibu J recuse himself from further participation in the above trial on the ground that the infringements disclosed in (1) constitute sufficient likelihood of bias.

The Application is supported by a 20-paragraph Affidavit deposed to by the 1st Appellant and a 2 -paragraph Affidavit deposed by the 2nd Appellant, wherein they both averred that they were arrested by Officials of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission [EFCC] on the 12th of December, 2007 accused of committing an offence within the jurisdiction of the Federal High Court, Kaduna, “in relation to certain amount of money, property of Delta State, which is alleged to have been transferred to a 3rd party for the benefit of the accused persons and which have been labeled ‘proceeds-of crime”‘. Furthermore, that none of the allegations have any connection with Kaduna and the alleged offences, properties, Bank accounts, documents, evidence and witnesses are not in Kaduna; that the EFCC filed the charges directly without following due process as required by the Federal High Court Act; and that the entire allegation is woven around legitimate expenditures of the Delta State Government. They both further averred as follows –

“That the said expenditures are justified by Government approvals and there exists a massive collection of documents needed to effectively defend either through cross examination and/or through my defence most of which were not adverted to by the Prosecution in the three volumes referred to above for obvious reasons and these documents include my personal record and various documents for which certified copies will be sought from several banks, underwriting agencies, stockbrokers, travel agencies, airline manifests, Delta State Government, Federal government of Nigeria etc include vouchers, approvals, minutes, gazettes, Executive Council Minutes, Security Council Minutes, House of Assembly Motions, executive mandates, authority to release expenditures mandates and other relevant government instruments- – (The 1st Appellant’s paragraph 12 and the 2nd Appellant’s paragraph 13)

“That it is both impracticable and impossible to gather these vital materials for my defence within one week for a variety of reasons-

(i) That my health suffered grievously while in prison and I am only now seeking appropriate medical attention.

(ii) That it is not possible to fully brief my legal team led by Mr. J.B Daudu SAN until I have fully recovered my health.

(iii) That I am aware that the 1999 Constitution guarantees that I should be given adequate time and facilities to prepare my defence.