The Supreme on Friday held that the lower courts were right to have convicted former Governor of Taraba State, Reverend Jolly Nyame, of corruption charges.
A five-man panel of the apex court presided over by Justice Mary Peter-Odili, consequently affirmed the decision of the Court of Appeal to sentence Nyame to 12 years imprisonment.
However, the apex court said the Appeal Court was wrong to have imposed a fine on him. Thus, it set aside all fines slammed on him by both the trial court and the appellate court.
The Appeal Court had fined Nyame N500m after convicting him of corruption charges to the tune N1.64bn.
In the lead judgment read by Justice Aminu Augie, on Friday, the apex court noted that the lower court was in order in reducing the initial prison terms from 14 years to 12 years, but was wrong to impose any fine on him, which the apex court described as excessive.
The Court of Appeal had on November 16, 2018, affirmed the conviction of the former governor by Justice Adebukola Banjoko of an Abuja High Court.
Justice Banjoko had in 2018 imposed the maximum sentence of 14 years on Nyame, having convicted him on all corruption charges levied against him by the federal government.
The trial Judge, in addition, imposed various fines running into millions of naira and ordered the forfeiture of his identified assets.
However, the Court of Appeal in its judgment on Nyame’s appeal reduced the sentence on the grounds that the trial court was wrong for imposing the maximum sentence on Nyame who was a first-time offender and accordingly reduced it to 12 years.
The appellate court however without prompting increased the fines imposed on the former governor by the trial court.
This prompted the former governor to approach the Supreme Court for intervention.
The former governor was charged by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission for allegedly diverting N1.64bn in May 2007.
In a 41-count charge of fraud, the commission accused Nyame of spearheading the fraudulent transfer of funds from the Taraba State’s treasury to a company, Saman Global for the purchase of office equipment and stationeries that were never delivered.
He was also accused of fraudulently enriching himself and abusing public trust.
In a lengthy judgment which lasted over five hours, the trial Judge Banjoko gave a holistic overview of the testimonies given in court which resulted in the judgment.
In her address, the Judge identified various confessions of fraudulent transactions and said the shreds of evidence against the defendant were overwhelming.
According to the Judge, even the defence witnesses alluded to the crimes contained in the charge against the defendant. She likened the conduct of the prescribed offences to the story of Alibaba and the forty thieves.
Citing a memo which formed the basis of the fraudulent transactions, Justice Banjoko questioned the motive behind Nyame’s ‘ratification’ of the said memo, despite the former governor’s claim that he knew nothing about the fraudulent transaction.
“From the evidence alluded in court, transactions by the treasury of the Taraba State government begin with a memo. Now a memo has a root course that is traceable to a decision,” adding that where the said memo becomes a proven source of questionable transactions, it would only be natural to trace the said memo to its source.
The Judge also questioned the failure of Nyame to investigate the illicit flow of funds under his watch, adding that Nyame confirmed in court that he never conducted any such investigation.
“It is only under cross-examination that the defendant said he did not carry out the investigation, because the EFCC was already carrying out a similar investigation.”
The Judge further noted confessions by witnesses, including the managing director of Saman Global, that the company was not involved in the delivery of stationeries.
“If Saman Global has no history of supplying stationeries into Taraba State, then their injection into the flow must have been questionable.
Banjoko narrated the testimonies of Nyame’s commissioner of finance, Abubakar Tutari, who spearheaded the many cases of administrative breaches in the transfer of the funds to Saman Global.
The Judge said although the defendant denies knowledge of the transactions, it is either that he, (Nyame) or Tutari has lied to the court.
“It is a question of Alhaji Tutari’s words against that of the defendant. So the golden question is who is lying between the two of them, because somebody is lying.” said the judge.
“It is imperative to bring to the fore, the background of Ababakar Tutari. According to the defendant, he was serving a senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Alhaji Tutari said he had known the defendant since 1992 when he was speaker of the Taraba state house of assembly.
Their relationship sprang from that time till when he was governor, in 1999. During this period, he served as a commissioner in four ministries, namely: finance, rural development, water resources, and sport and youth development. So they were close,” Bankole said.
The Judge further noted that Tutari who had told the court that the defendant was his benefactor had also indicated his willingness to not bite the finger that fed him.
Yet following the testimonies of witnesses in court, the Judge noted that Tutari bypassed the permanent secretary and instructed the accountant to pay N250m.
“By this act, Alhaji Abubakar Tutari certainly had cloud to have pulled the rug from under the feet of the ministry of finance. One thing alone is certain, he was not appointed by the people of Taraba State, but by the defendant who was elected by the people,” said the Judge.
