Justice Mohammed Garuba Umar of the Federal High Court in Abuja has rejected the bid by presidential candidate of the of the African Alliance Congress, AAC, Omoyele Sowore, to tender uncertified documents in his trial for allegedly making defamatory statements against President Bola Tinubu.
The judge on Wednesday refused the bid when Sowore’s lead counsel, Olumide Fusika, SAN, applied to tender some uncertified documents through another lawyer, Barrister Wayne Chikezie Elijah.
The documents are summary of proceedings in testimony of a witness codenamed XYZ, along with other vital letters.
Midway into the Wednesday’s proceedings Fusika had called Elijah as his third witness in the defense of the activist for the purpose of tendering the vital documents.
Trouble had started when the registrar of the court announced that those to testify in the matter for the defense should leave the courtroom and go out of hearing, an announcement the lawyer failed to honour.
When he was called into the witness box as second witness for the day, DSS lawyer, Akinlolu Kehinde, SAN, asked him to confirm his presence in court when the first witness of the day, Uwen Davis, was testifying.
Sensing the implications of his being in the courtroom, against the registrar’s directive, the legal practitioner informed Justice Mohammed Garuba Umar that he was inside and outside the courtroom when the first witness was giving evidence.
The DSS counsel proceeded to object to the tendering of the documents on the ground that they were public documents and ought to be certified before they can
