An Ado-Ekiti Magistrates’ Court on Wednesday sentenced a Deeper Life Bible Church Pastor, Anjorin Adaniki, 42, and one Maliu Aliu, 40, to one year imprisonment each without an option of fine for fraud.
Magistrate Bayode Owoeye found the convicts guilty of fraudulently converting 1,800 bags of fertilisers which were meant to be distributed to farmers in Emure Local Government Area of Ekiti.
The fertilizers, which were to be sold at subsidised rate of N2, 750 per bag were sold by the convicts to the farmers at N3, 500 per bag amounting to N9.5 million.
Owoeye ruled that the action of the pastor and his co-convict was “callous’’ by converting the fertilisers meant for the farmers to their own advantage.
After the magistrate pronounced the convicts guilty, their lawyer, Mr Ademola Okeya, pleaded with court to tamper justice with mercy in sentencing them.
During trial, the Police Prosecutor, Sergeant Oriyomo Akinwale, had told the court that the accused committed the offence between May and June, 2013 at Emure-Ekiti.
He said that three lorry loads of fertilisers fraudulently converted by the convicts were provided by the Ekiti Government to ease the suffering of farmers and to help in improving their produce.
According to him, the offence contravenes Section 1(3) of the Advanced Free Fraud and other Related Offence Act LFN, 2006.
The convicts had earlier pleaded not guilty to the charges preferred against them.
