The Court of Appeal sitting in Abuja on Friday morning dismissed the appeal brought by the Senate President, Dr. Bukola Saraki against his trial at the Code of Conduct Tribunal, CCT.
The Appeal Court, which dismissed the argument of Saraki that the CCT was not a court of competent jurisdiction to handle the criminal charges preferred against him, ruled that, “The CCT is a court of criminal jurisdiction, albeit limited jurisdiction.”
The three-man panel of judges led by Moore Adumein held that the tribunal was properly constituted to try the Senate President, adding that “The immediate question is whether it is a court or not. There is no inherent difference between a court and a tribunal. The only difference is that tribunals in most cases handle special cases.
“The tribunal has power to impose sanctions according to the law. It is a court with specific criminal jurisdiction,” it asserted.
Regarding Saraki’s argument that the CCT is not properly constituted to try him, Adumein stated that the two-man panel of the Tribunal was the minimum quorum required according to the interpretation act to sit in judgment on any issue; hence the tribunal did not err in law to commence trial against Saraki with a two-man panel.
Meanwhile, another member of the panel, Justice J.E. Ekanem upheld Saraki’s appeal, declaring the charge before the CCT as incompetent. Justice Ekanem specifically quashed the charge and discharged Saraki on the basis that the Deputy Director at the Ministry of Justice, M. M. S. Hassan who signed the charge, did not specify who authorized him to initiate the criminal proceeding.
“A look at the charge showed that Mr. Hassan instituted the action pursuant to section 24 of the Code of Conduct Bureau and Tribunal Act, 2004 which permits only the Attorney General of the Federation to initiate criminal proceedings”.
Justice Ekanem stressed that though the constitution permits the Solicitor-General of the Federation, SGF, to commence criminal action in the absence of the AGF, he said that Hassan failed to produce any document showing that he was properly authorized by the SGF.
“The opening paragraph of the letter Hassan sent to the CCT on September 11, wherein he applied to commence trial against the appellant is very instructive.
“He merely said ‘ I am authorized to file this action’ but did not say that he was authorized by the Solicitor-General. He went short of identifying who authorized him.
“It is therefore my view that the charge before the tribunal is incompetent. It is for this view that I hold that this appeal has succeeded and I hereby set-aside the charge and discharge the accused person”, Justice Ekanem held.
With this development, it still not clear whether the Senate President’s case will continue at the Code of Conduct Tribunal on November 5 as earlier fixed.
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