- Kano State Chief Judge Accused Of Abuse Of Judicial Process
Petition available to universalreporters.info indicates that the Kano State Judiciary is currently enmeshed in a N22 million fraud, the said amount belongs to a group of orphans whose parents are late.
In a petition titled; Complaint Of Delaying The Course Of Justice And Abuse Of Office By Chief Judge Of Kano State Honourable Justice Shehu Atiku which was signed by Mohammed Sani Bala for and on behalf of the families addressed to the National Judicial Council, stated that they are 113 individuals consisting of eight families whose monies were misappropriated at City No1 Shari’a Court, Kofar Kudu, Kano.
According to the petitioners in their petition stated thus: “Our problems started after the death of our late parents. Following their death at different times we approached City No 1 Shari’a Court,Kofar Kudu, Kano to share the estate left behind by them in accordance with to Shari’a. We deposited cash and cheques issued infavor of the court to be shared among 113 of us. We paid all necessary filing fees to the court.”
Rather than sharing the said money that was deposited at the court, the money went missing, according to the petition; “one Abubakar Abdullahi a finance registrar of the court misappropriated N22, 965,060.57K (Twenty Two Million Nine Hundred and sixty five thousand, sixty Naira fifty Seven Kobo Only) of our money.”
However, when they families discovered that the money was misappropriated in 2011, a letter of a complaint was forwarded by the family to the presiding judge of City No 1 Kofar Kudu, Kano, Attorney -General and Commissioner of Justice Kano State and Grand Khadi of the Kano State Shari’a Court of Appeal.
According to them, they said that the Attorney General and Grand Khadi confirmed to them that Abubakar Abdullahi had misappropriated the money.
However, after waiting to no avail they decided to write through their lawyers, who then wrote to the Chief Judge of Kano State being the Chairman of Judicial Service Commission and also to two other members of the Commission, the Grand Kadi and Attorney General and Commissioner of Justice Kano state who were given seven days ultimatum to pay us the N22 million, demanding that failure to do so, they would undertake a legal action because they are vicariously liable for the act of Abubakar Abdullahi, who also is a staff of the Kano State Judicial Service Commission.
Moreso, the counsel to the orphans, filed a case before the Kano State High Court on the 8th January, 2013 to recover their money, however Universalreporters.info gathered that things had not turned to their favour as the Chief Judge of Kano State has sat on the case file and refused to assign the case to court for adjudication.
According to the petitioners, the said that their investigation reveals that a case in Kano State High Court is normally directed to court by the Chief Judge between two to five days from the date it was filed, but in their case, it has become different.
The petitioners passionately begged the NJC to help in this matter as part of their petition read thus: “My Lord we want inform you that most of the heirs left behind by our late parents are orphans, widows and aged women. We are downtrodden; we are poor with no body to assist us except Almighty Allah through you. We took our plight to various people to assist us but there was no positive response; it is only Radio Freedom Kano, our lawyers and Association of Lawyers in Kano that are assisting us right now.”
“My Lord we are not happy with the attitude of Chief Judge of Kano State. He is using his position to delay our case and frustrate us. We have no faith in Kano Courts. We are afraid that we might not get our money back except you intervene. We want you take our case by yourself and decide it because we have confidence that you will do justice to us. We have no doubt whoever assisted person cheated in this world, Allah (swt) will reward him on the Day of Judgment.”
