The Union Newspapers To Appeal Against Court Ruling In Favour Of El-rufai

By Idibia Gabriel, Kaduna

The Union newspapers has hinted that it will appeal against the ruling delivered in favour of the Governor of kaduna State Mallam Nasir El-rufai in kaduna state high court after due consultation.

The kaduna State high court sitting in kaduna, in its ruling on Thursday refused to grant The Union newspaper the application to recall the Governor for further cross examination on assets he declared as Director General Bureau of Public Enterprises, BPE, and Minister of Federal Capital Territory, Abuja respectively.

The Union newspapers had filed application before the high court 2 in kaduna requesting it to recall the governor for cross examination on El-rufai’s past assets declaration form brought before the court, which was countered by the plaintiff counsel, AA Mustapha SAN, on ground that the client had been cross examined before.

During the ruling on Thursday, Justice Mario Muhammad granted the application of the plaintiffs stopping the court from recalling El-rufai for further cross examination on the grounds that the defendant did not input that it will recall the governor during pre-trial conference.

Speaking to journalists at the end of the session, the counsel to defendant Barr. Hilfan A Abuul said the judgement was unfair to his clients.

He said it’s unfair for the judge to rely on pre-trial Conference even when materials presented by the PW contradicted the assets declaration forms earlier submitted.
“We filed application to recall him so we can confront him with the new sets of facts, because there are material contradictions… Well we accept, being the final verdict. But being that it’s not the final court, we’ll discuss with our clients on the next line of action to take. We can say that the ruling is against our right to fair hearing”, he said.

The case was later adjourned till 24th May 2020 for the continuation of defense.