Press Release
Justice E. S. Chukwu of the Federal High Court, Maitama, Abuja, on
Wednesday, December 17, 2014 adjourned ruling on the extradition proceedings brought
by the office of Attorney General of the Federation against former managing
director of Nigeria Security Minting and Printing Company, NSMPC, Ehidiamhem
Okoyomon, to January 23, 2015.
Okoyomon is wanted in the United Kingdom over his alleged role in the
bribery scandal involving officials of the Central Bank of Nigeria, the NSMPC
and Securency International Pty of Australia between 2006 and 2008.
In a bid to stall his extradition to the UK for trial over the alleged
bribe scam, Okoyomon had in October, through his counsel, Alex Iziyon, SAN,
challenged the jurisdiction of the court to entertain the application to
extradite him.
Iziyon had argued that the 1931 treaty which the prosecution counsel M.
S. Hassan relied upon had been repealed by Decree No 87 of 1966, and was not a
law.
Hassan had however countered his argument explaining that the 1931
treaty became applicable to Nigeria in 1935 and was never repealed by any
enactment, stressing that schedule 2 under extradition law provides that “the
law shall apply to all Commonwealth nations”.
It would be recalled that Justice Chukwu after listening to the argument
of both counsel had on October 7, 2014 fixed December 1, 2014 for ruling
on the matter.
However, justice Chukwu adjourned his ruling on that day (December 1,
2014) to December 17, 2014 for reasons that he had not finished writing the
ruling.
At the resumed sitting today, the judge asked both the prosecuting and
defence counsel to come back on January 23, 2015 as the ruling was almost
ready.
Wilson Uwujaren
Head, Media & Publicity
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