The All Progressives Congress (APC), on Wednesday, presented
to the Federal High Court, Abuja, two more documents to prove its allegation of
certificate forgery against Edo State Governor, Godwin Obaseki.
They are University of Ibadan degree certificates, belonging
to Professor Emmanuel Dele Balogun, and a report by a forensic document
examiner, Assistant Superintendent of Police, (ASP), Raphael Onwuzuligbo.
Both were admitted in evidence by the court after the lead
counsel of the plaintiffs, Akin Olujimi (SAN) tendered.
The first degree certificate in Agricultural Science
submitted was awarded to Balogun in 1979, the same year with that of Obaseki.
The second document was admitted with a caveat following
objections to their admissibility raised by the first and second defendants.
The APC and a chieftain, Williams Edobor had dragged
Obaseki, the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) and the Independent National
Electoral Commission (INEC) to court.
At Tuesday’s proceedings, the plaintiffs, through a
subpoenaed witness, Samuel Omale, an INEC Legal Officer, tendered form EC9
completed and Obaseki submitted to INEC ahead of the governorship poll.
During cross examination on Wednesday, Balogun told the
court that he had never seen the controversial degree certificate issued to
Obaseki by the University of Ibadan.
The witness stated that he never worked in the admission
department of the institution, and could not comment on the certificate.
Replying to a question on photocopying, Balogun said when a
document to be photocopied is not properly placed in the machine; it is
possible for some parts of the original not to be included in the copy.
“If you do not scale it, some parts will be left out and it
will not be a true reflection of the original documents”, he said.
Attempts by the plaintiffs to call in their fourth witness
was challenged by the first and second defendants on grounds that they had
exhausted the number of days the court provided to call their witnesses.
Justice Ahmed Mohammed overruled. He reminded that several
issues came up that affected the time given to the plaintiffs and assured that
similar consideration would be extended to the defendants.
Obaseki should just prepare to go or better still, throw in the stinking towel that he never merited to grab and hide his head in the mountinneous heap of shame of debauchery!
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