Hot argument on whether the present judge, Justice Rahman Oshodi handling the criminal trial of the former Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, before the Ikeja Special Offences Court should recuse himself from presiding over the case anymore on grounds of alleged bias from the defence.
Several prayers of this nature have occured before the high court, where prominent personalities facing trials through their lawyers demanding for the withdrawal of the presiding judge hearing their cases.
While both the defence and prosecution team argued for and against the removal of the trial judge, the court reserved ruling until Feb.26 to decide whether or not to continue to hear the case of the embattled ex-Governor of Central Bank, Godwin Emefiele.
Emefiele is standing trial on a 19-count charge bordering on receiving gratification and corrupt demand preferred against him by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC).
His co-defendant, Henry Omoile, is facing a three-count charge bordering on unlawful acceptance of gifts by agents.
Justice Rahman Oshodi adjourned for ruling after Emefiele’s Counsel, Mr Olalekan Ojo (SAN) and Omoile’s counsel, Mr Kazeem Gbadamosi (SAN) asked the court to recuse itself on the allegation of bias.
EFCC Lead Counsel, Mr Rotimi Oyedepo (SAN) had closed the evidence-in-chief of the seventh prosecution witness, Mr Adetola John and the court had asked defence to cross-examine the witness.
Defence, however, refused to cross examine the witness and unanimously through oral application, asked the court to recuse self on the allegation of bias.
Oyedepo, in his response, opposed vehemently to the application of the defence.
“In this proceeding, your lordship had numerous times rule against the prosecution and if defence is dissatisfied with the ruling of the court, they can appeal.
“I do not know what defence is trying to prove by telling this court to recuse itself because in this case, there is no evidence of allegation of bias.
“This is a form of delay tactics and I urge your lordship to discountenance this application because a reasonable person in this court will realise that this application is meant to delay this trial.
“The court had earlier granted accelerated hearing in this case and I urge this honourable court to ask defence to cross-examine the witness.”
Earlier, the witness, at the continuation of his evidence-in-chief had spoken into a document which was not tendered as exhibit before the court.
John had told the court that he did not receive any complain about the 400,000 US dollars he delivered as instructed during business hours of the day.
When the witness was asked by prosecution to confirm the WhatsApp message said to have been printed from his phone, the defence team objected on the ground that the document was solely meant for identification and was not an exhibit before the court.
Oshodi overrule the defence team and allowed the witness to read from the document marked for identification.
Following the proceeding, the counsel expressed dissatisfaction with the court’s decision.
Defense team had opposed on the ground that the document was solely meant for identification purpose and it was not an exhibit before the court.
They had argued that the witness could not read or speak into the document.
The document which the court received as identification purpose was a bundle of documents which contained Whatsapp messages of one Eric, the Personal assistant to Emefiele.
Earlier, Emefiele’s counsel had informed the court of an application seeking for a VB to leave to allow the embattled former CBN governor appeal the ruling delivered on Jan. 8 challenging the jurisdiction of the court to hear his case.
