Court adjourns Goje’s ‘N6bn fraud’ case

A federal high court sitting in Jos, Plateau state, has adjourned the alleged N6 billion fraud trial of Danjuma Goje, former governor of Gombe state.

The Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) had filed a 21-count charge of alleged N25 billion fraud against Goje but later reduced it to N6 billion.

Nineteen of the 21 charges were later struck out, leaving only two counts in Goje’s “no-case submission”.

However, the anti-graft agency had withdrawn from the corruption case and handed it over to the office of the attorney-general of the federation on June 7.

The anti-graft agency had pulled out of the case 24 hours after Goje, who was in the senate presidency race, stepped down to endorse Ahmad Lawan, who was then the preferred candidate of the leadership of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

When the case came up before Babatunde Quadiri, the presiding judge, on Friday, Pius Akutah, an assistant chief state counsel of the AGF, applied for a short adjournment to enable them study the case file.

“My Lord, l wish to confirm to this honorable court that the EFCC has formally forwarded the case file to us, having taken over the matter from them on June 7,” Akutah said.

“We are aware that on that day, June 7, the case was adjourned for further hearing, but because we are still studying the case file to have a full grasp of the entire matter, we shall be asking for a short adjournment.”

Aladele Oyelami, counsel to Goje, did not object to the application for adjournment.

“My Lord, on our part we are not objecting to the application made by the prosecution counsel,” Oyelami said.

The judge, therefore, adjourned the case till July 4 for further hearing.