The Federal High Court in Lagos has found a former Abia state governor, Orji Uzor Kalu, and two others guilty of N7.65bn fraud.
Kalu’s co-defendants are his firm, Slok Nigeria Limited and Udeh Udeogu, who was Director of Finance and Accounts at the Abia State Government House during Kalu’s tenure as governor.
Kalu’s company, Slok Nig. Ltd., was also a defendant in the suit. While Kalu and his company were convicted on all the 39 counts of the fraud charge, Udeogo was found guilty of 34 counts.
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Meanwhile, The Herald reported that Appeal Court sitting in Owerri on Thursday affirmed the election of Sen. Orji Kalu, representing Abia North Senatorial District.
In a unanimous decision, the appellate court held that the lower tribunal, which upturned Orji Kalu’s election, erred on several counts.
Delivering the judgment, the Presiding Judge, Justice R. A. Adah, said that the grounds upon which the lower tribunal predicated its verdict were not tenable in law. He said that the lower tribunal granting the petitioner’s reliefs, which he did not ask for, was unacceptable in law.
Addressing newsmen at the end of the judgment, Counsel for Kalu, Mr Perfect Okorie, said that “the relief the petitioner, Sen. Mao Ohuabunwa, asked for was for the nullification of the election in Bende and Isiukwuato.”
Okorie said that the lower tribunal while embarking on its own expedition, “granted strange reliefs and nullified elections in some polling units in Ohafia and Arochukwu.”
The appellate court further said that Ohuabunwa literally dumped his avalanche of documents on the lower tribunal without calling witnesses to tie the document to his case.
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