Joe Dinga Pefok
5 May 2008
A three-man jury of the Littoral Appeal Court headed by Justice Kamtchuing, on April 30, ruled that the former General Manager of the Port Authority of Douala, PAD, Alphonse Siyam Siwe, former PAD Board Chairman, Rtd. Colonel Edouard Etonde Ekoto and 11 others, will face re-trial in the alleged embezzlement of FCFA 40 billion.
The decision followed appeals filed at the Appeal Court by defence lawyers on behalf of Siwe Siyam, Etonde and two others, against the imprisonment sentences that were slammed on them by the Wouri High Court on December 13, 2007.
The Appeal Court had earlier fixed March 25 as the day to examine the request to appeal the case, to decide whether the court should entertain the appeal or not. But the Chief Judge postponed the matter to April 29 because the New Bell Prison warders brought the prisoners to court late.
Meanwhile, on April 29, the defence teams took turns to challenge the judgments that were passed against their clients. The lead defence lawyer for Siyam Siwe, Anatole Nga Ayissi, for example, presented a seven-point objection, arguing that the judgment against his client violated articles in the Cameroon Penal Code, the OHADA Law, as well as the status of PAD as contained in the text set out by the presidential decree that created it.
The longest argument in objection to the High Court ruling was, however, presented by Etonde's defence led by Barrister Emmanuel Pensy. The three lawyers revisited the embezzlement accusation from when Etonde was stripped of his parliamentary immunity, how the case was handled in what they considered a controversial manner in the High Court, to the passing of the judgment which they rejected as a travesty of justice.
The lawyers even challenged the competence of the High Court to have handled such a case.As for the lawyers of one of the prisoners, Francis Marie Siwe Nintcheu (former PAD Technical Director), they swore that the judgment passed against their client was one of the greatest scandals in the history of the Cameroon judiciary.
They said Nintcheu's functions at PAD never put him in contact with the firm's money. Meanwhile, lawyers for Simon Pierre Ewodo Noah (PAD Deputy General Manager) insisted that their client was a victim of injustice, and that he never embezzled a franc at PAD.
On their part, the state prosecutor as well as the civil party (lawyers of PAD) did not only call on the Appeal Court not to entertain the demand to appeal the case, and thus maintain its ruling, but they argued that the High Court rulings were too lenient on the accused persons.
It would be recalled that the prosecution and civil party had before the handing down of the jail terms by the Wouri High Court last December, urged the court to slam a life imprisonment on the four accused persons.
The Littoral Appeal Court, after listening to all the parties for and against the entertainment of an appeal to the embezzlement case, decided to start the case afresh.Though the court dismissed the claim by the defence that the Wouri High Court was incompetent to have handled the case, Justice Kamtchuing declared that he wanted the re-trial to start right away on that April 30.
But the defence lawyers pleaded for a postponement to give them time to invite witnesses to appear in court. After some deliberations between the different parties, the Chief Judge postponed the commencement of the re-trial to May 12, 2008.
He reiterated that the Appeal Court will treat all the charges leveled against the accused persons afresh and thus without any consideration or reference to what happened at the High Court.
The judge also called on all those responsible for bringing the four imprisoned persons (Siyam Siwe, Etonde, Noah, and Nintcheu) to court, to ensure that they are brought on time.
"I will not again want to see a situation of bringing some of the accused persons to court, before moving to another part of town to bring another one, while the court is forced to wait," the Judge declared.
It is worth noting that the four persons are not serving their imprisonment terms at the same location. While, Etonde, Noah, and Nintcheu are the New Bell Prison, Siyam Siwe is still at the Littoral Gendarmerie Legion at Bonanjo, where he has been held since February 2006.
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