Taiwo Popoola
The Supreme Court has ordered that Lagos socialite, Fred Ajudua, should be returned to prison custody preparatory to the resumption of his trial in relation to a $1,043,000 fraud case brought against him by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC.
A five-member panel of the apex court issued the order in a unanimous judgment delivered on Friday in an appeal, marked SC/CR/51/2019, filed in the name of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, FRN, by the EFCC, with Ajudua as the sole respondent.
In the lead judgment by Justice Chioma Nwosu-Iheme, the apex court revoked the bail granted to Ajudua by the Court of Appeal in Lagos in a judgment delivered on December 10, 2018.
Justice Nwosu-Iheme held that the Court of Appeal had no jurisdiction to grant the bail it granted Ajudua in the December 10, 2018 judgment, having found incompetent the brief of argument filed in Ajudua’s appeal against a July 5, 2018 ruling by Justice Mojisola Dada of the High Court of Lagos State, Ikeja, rejecting his request for pre-trial bail.
The judge further held that, having found that Ajudua’s brief of argument was incompetent and proceeded to strike it out, the Court of Appeal was wrong to have still considered the incompetent brief and granted the appellant’s prayer for pre-trial bail.
She said: “It is crystal clear that the lower court was on all fours with the law when it declared the appellant’s brief of argument incompetent and struck it out.
“At that point, the appellant’s (Ajudua’s) appeal was extinguished. There was, therefore, nothing more to consider in that appeal. The lower court, at that point, had no jurisdiction to proceed further. It had become functus officio.”
Justice Nwosu-Iheme held that the action of the lower court, in proceeding to consider the arguments canvassed in the brief of argument it had earlier found to be incompetent, was an exercise in futility and a complete nullity.
She added: “Since the lower court had no jurisdiction to consider other issues canvassed in the brief of argument, which it had declared incompetent and struck out, it would amount to an academic exercise to delve into any other issue in the appeal.
“This appeal, having been determined on the issue of jurisdiction alone, the issue of bail is inseparable from the appeal itself.
“This appeal succeeds, and it is hereby allowed. The decision of the trial court dated the 5th day of July 2018 refusing bail to the respondent (Ajudua) is hereby restored.
“The respondent is to be remanded in prison custody. Accordingly, this case is remitted back to the Chief Judge of Lagos State to be assigned to the same trial judge, M. A. Dada J, for the continuation of speedy trial and determination within the shortest possible time,” Justice Nwosu-Iheme said.
The Embassy of the State of Palestine had, in a letter dated August 26, 1993, to the then Minister of Foreign Affairs and copied to the IGP, accused Ajudua of obtaining $1,043,000 by false pretence from a Palestinian, Ziad Abu Zalaf, who was then based in Germany.
Upon the completion of the investigation, the EFCC filed a 12-count charge against Ajudua before the High Court of Lagos State in Ikeja.
In the charge, the EFCC alleged, among others, that Ajudua conspired with one Joseph Ochunor, who is still at large, to obtain money by false pretences from Ziad Abu Zalaf of Technical International Ltd., a division of Mystic Company Ltd., a German-based company.
It also alleged that, with intent to defraud, Ajudua and Ochunor obtained $268,000 on April 2, 1993, from Zalaf and on May 12, 1993, again obtained the sum of $225,000 from Zalaf.
The EFCC equally claimed that Ajudua and Ochunor, in a bid to give credence to the alleged scam, forged a Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) receipt and a Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) document and presented them to the foreigner as genuine.
Ajudua was subsequently arraigned. But, before trial could commence, his lawyer, Olalekan Ojo, brought an application for pre-trial bail, claiming his client was suffering from a serious health challenge.
In a ruling on July 5, 2018, Justice Dada refused the bail application and ordered him to submit himself for trial, a decision Ajudua appealed at the Court of Appeal in Lagos.
It its judgment on December 10, 2018, a three-member panel of the Court of Appeal reversed Justice Dada’s decision and granted bail to Ajudua.
In the lead judgment of the Court of Appeal, Justice Mohammed Garba held, among others, that bail is a constitutional right, which the appellant (Ajudua) ought to enjoy.
The EFCC was dissatisfied with the decision of the Court of Appeal and challenged it at the Supreme Court, which appeal the apex court allowed in it judgment on Friday and proceeded to restore the earlier decision of Justice Dada denying bail to Ajudua.
