Abuja Property Developer’s Electricity Theft Trial Stalls Due To Discrepancies In Witness Statement

The trial of alleged electricity theft filed by the Federal Government against an Abuja property developer, Cecil Osakwe was on Tuesday, stalled at the Federal High Court, Abuja due to some discrepancies in the prosecution witness statement .

At the resumed trial, the prosecutor, Mr Alibaba Mamman called his witness, Mr John Suleiman who adopted his witness statement and identified some exhibits said to be the numbers of metres that were allegedly tempered with.

The defence counsel, Mr Victor Giwa, however, raised objections to the tendering of the exhibits on the grounds that the prosecutor had not attached such documents to the witness statement of Suleiman that he made available to him.

The trial judge, Justice Binta Nyako agreed that if such documents were not attached to Suleiman’s witness statement, he was not the right person to tender the documents in court.

In view of the following, the prosecutor prayed the court for an adjournment to enable him put his house in order.

Earlier, a prosecution witness, Mr Gabriel Ojo who identified himself as a former staff of the Abuja Electricity Distribution Company, (AEDC) told the court that he had received a complaint from a whistle blower on the alleged theft of electricity at one of the property of the defendant.

Ojo said that he constituted a team who investigated the complaint after which the report was forwarded to the management of the AEDC.

“I believe that the management passed the report to the revenue protection unit but I do not know what happened thereafter,” Ojo said.

He also told the court that he could not remember the names of the security guards at the defendants property that his team interacted with in the course of their investigations.

The case has been adjourned until July 3, for continuation of trial.

NAN reports that Osakwe was accused of tampering with electricity metres, resulting in the government losing N11 million in revenue, thereby committing an offence contrary to section 1(10) of the Miscellaneous Offences Act.

He was allegedly caught by the Abuja Electricity Distribution Company (AEDC) officials for allegedly stealing electricity at various properties, including his residence.

The defendant, however, challenged the legality of the task force that investigated the process leading to his arraignment.

He claimed that the task force was unknown to the law.