The police opened the trial of the APGA chair accused of forging a Supreme Court judgement, after announcing that a court official would be their witness in the case.
The police on Monday, opened trial in the case involving alleged forgery of a Supreme Court judgement by the National Chairman of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), Edozie Njoku, and another person.
They were accused of forging a Supreme Court judgement that recognised Mr Njoku as the national chairman of the party.
The case is before the Federal Capital Territory High Court, Bwari, Abuja.
Messrs Njoku and Nwoga were earlier arraigned on 21 October 2022 on a charge of 14 counts of conspiring with others to forge a judgment of the Supreme Court. They denied the charges.
But the police further investigated the allegation and lodged an amended charge of 14 counts dated 6 February against the two men. The amendment brought in an official of the Supreme Court, Adebisi Ogunseye, as a co-defendant.
The police listed Ms Adebisi, a former secretary to Mary Peter-Odili, a retired Justice of the Supreme Court as the third defendant in the amended charge.
However, at Monday's proceedings, the lawyer representing the police, Rimamsomte Ezekiel, informed the trial judge, Mohammed Madugu, that he would continue the trial with the initial charge against Messrs Njoku and Nwoga.
He then withdrew the amended charge that had the Supreme Court official as a defendant.
Giving reasons for the withdrawal of the amended charge, Mr Rimamsomte explained that the police intended to present Mrs Adebisi as a prosecution witness.
The defendants' lawyer, Panam Ntui, did not object to the police's withdrawal of the amended charge on Monday.
Consequently, the judge struck it out and commenced the trial of the defendants.
Trial
After the judge struck out the amended charge, the prosecution called its first witness, Godwin Odu.
Mr Odu, led in evidence by Mr Rinasonte, said he emerged the deputy national secretary of APGA at the party's convention held in Awka, Anambra State, on 31 May 2019.
Mr Odu informed the court that it was after the Awka convention that Mr Njoku, began parading himself as the new national chairman of APGA.
"I wrote a petition to the police that (Mr) Njoku forged the judgement he is using in parading (himself) as national chairman of our party," Mr Odu told the court.
After Mr Odu concluded his evidence-in-chief, the judge adjourned the suit until 27 April for continuation of trial.
Charge
In the charge, Messrs Njoku and Nwoga are accused of falsifying a judgment delivered by the Supreme Court on 14 October 2021 in the appeal marked: SC/CV/686/2021 and inserting Njoku's name as the second defendant when he was never a party in the case.
They were said to have written four justices of the Supreme Court- Mary Peter-Odili, Kudirat Kekere-Ekun, Mohammed Garba and Ibrahim Saulawa who sat on the case, asking them to insert Mr Njoku's name as the second respondent.
The police accused the defendants of engaging the services of some officials of the Supreme Court who inserted Mr Njoku's name on the judgement, which Mr Njoku allegedly tendered to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and the Inspector General of Police.
Mr Njoku in the allegedly forged judgement, claimed the Supreme Court had declared him as APGA's National Chairman.
In one of the charges, Messrs Njoku and Nwoga alongside others who are now at large "dishonestly and deliberately forged the judgement of the Supreme Court of Nigeria.. with the name of Chief Edozie Njoku as the second respondent, knowing that he was not a party to the case, using same as a genuine judgment of the Supreme Court with the intent to mislead members of the public, and ridiculing the Judiciary of the Federal Republic of Nigeria."
The alleged offence is said to be in violation of Section 366 of the Penal Code Law.
In another count, the police accused the defendants of fabricating "a letter to the Inspector-General of Police under false pretence that" Mr Njoku is APGA's National Chairman, an offence punishable under Section 178 of the Penal Code Law.
The police accused Mr Njoku of forging APGA's letter-head, which he used to the IGP as the party's National Chairman, an offence punishable under Section 366 of the Penal Code law.
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But despite the pending charge against the defendants, the Supreme Court, acting on a request by Mr Njoku, affirmed him as the national chairman of APGA in a ruling delivered in March this year.
Specifically, Mr Njoku had asked the Supreme Court to correct an "accidental slip" at page 13, lines 3 to 4 of its judgment which had Victor Oye's name mistakenly inserted as the national chairman of APGA instead of 'Edozie Njoku'. Mr Njoku claimed that it was him who was unlawfully removed from his position as duly elected National Chairman of APGA at a national convention of the party in Owerri in 2019, that the Supreme Court intended to restore to office in the judgement.
APGA has been embroiled in a vicious leadership crisis that ended up at the Supreme Court.
Granting Mr Njoku's request, a five-member panel of the Supreme Court on 24 March, said it made a mistake in the judgement it delivered in 2021, where it erroneously wrote the name of Victor Oye as APGA national chairman instead of that of Edozie Njoku.
But the police accused Mr Njoku of forging the Supreme Court's judgement on the APGA leadership tussle.
Mr Njoku denied the charges.
