Justice Chuka Obiozor, a vacation judge, refused to entertain Dudafa’s application, saying he was not convinced that there was any emergency. Dudafa’s application urged the court to release his passport to enable him to travel abroad to treat a spinal cord injury. He allegedly sustained the injury while in the custody of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC). Dudafa, who is facing a N5.1billion fraud trial before Justice Mohammed Idris of the same court, deposited his passport in the court’s custody as part of his bail conditions. But he told Justice Obiozor that he needed to urgently travel abroad for a medical appointment and urged the court to release the passport to him. Defence counsel Kolawole Salami said the medical appointment was earlier scheduled for July 18 and 19, 2017 but had to be rescheduled for July 28, 2017 as Dudafa had yet to get access to his passport. He urged Justice Obiozor to hear and grant the application, saying his client’s health was at stake. But his prayer failed to convince the judge. The judge reasoned that if there was truly an emergency, Dudafa would have ensured that his application, which was filed since May, was heard by Justice Mohammed Idris who ordered him to deposit the passport, before the judge proceeded on vacation. Justice Obiozor rejected Salami’s explanation that hearing of the application before Justice Idris was stalled due to the EFCC’s failure to respond to the application despite being served. He said he would not be the one to release Dudafa’s passport to him, and directed him to wait till October 16, 2017 when Justice Idris, who ordered Dudafa to deposit the passport, would have returned from vacation. “Let him reschedule to October; he can reschedule to October,” Justice Obiozor said. The EFCC is prosecuting Dudafa on 23 counts bordering on fraud and money laundering. He is standing trial alongside his ex-account officer at Heritage Bank, Joseph Iwuejo, who was said to have aided him to perpetrate the alleged fraud. The anti-graft agency alleged that between June 2013 and June 2015, Dudafa and Iwuejo, who also claimed to be Taiwo Ebenezer and Olugbenga Isaiah, used different companies to fraudulently launder various sums of money running into N5.1bn. But Dudafa and Iwuejo pleaded not guilty to the charge.]]>

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