Court dismisses corruption charges against ex-Enugu gov, Chimaroke Nnamani

A Federal High Court sitting in Lagos has, on Tuesday, dismissed the corruption charges against a former governor of Enugu State, Chimaroke Nnamani.


The ruling delivered by the judge,  Chuka Obiozor struck out the charges against the former governor  for lack of “proper charges” before it.

The judge gave the ruling after saying that the affidavit filed by Mr. Nnamani showed that the court had entered judgement in the same suit on July 5, 2015, by another judge, Mohammed Yunusa.

Rickey Tarfa, counsel to Mr. Nnamani, had informed the court that the defendant filed a motion disclosing the facts that this case has been put to rest by Mr. Yunusa in his judgement suit no FHc/L/09c/07.

According to Mr. Tarfa, a senior advocate of Nigeria, parties in the suit had entered a plea bargain before Mr. Yunusa and there is no valid pending charges before the Judge, Obiozor, as the court cannot sit on appeal for the case of another judge of concurrent jurisdiction.

However, the EFCC prosecutor, Kelvin Uzozie, argued that he had looked at the affidavits filed by the defendant in the case and was applying that the entire proceedings be expunged to enable him file fresh charges against Mr. Nnamani.

But the judge ruled saying, “I agree that in view of the plea bargain judgement of this court delivered on the 7th of July, 2015, that there is no valid charge before me and I thereby expunge the entire proceedings before me.”