6th May, 2019
The Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) has filed a dismissal suit before an Abuja Court of Appeal, asking that the court to set aside the acquittal granted to the suspended Director-General of Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), Mounir Gwarzo.
Gwarzo and the Executive Commissioner of SEC, Corporate Services, Zakawanu Garuba were arraigned in June 2018 before Justice Husseini Baba Yusuf of Court 4 of the FCT High Court on a 5-Count bordering on fraud.
The commission in a statement by its spokesperson Rasheedat Okoduwa on Monday told the court that Justice Hussein Baba-Yusuf of the FCT High Court, 4, erred in his ruling when he freed Gwarzo and a former Commissioner of SEC, Zakawanu Garuba of N104.9 million severance package and car allowance fraud.
Okoduwa said that counsel to the anti-graft agency, Raheem Adesina, asked the appellate court for a retrial on 12 grounds and urged that the case should be reassigned to another judge because the reasons for Gwarzo’s acquittal were against the extant laws that set up the commission and other government agencies.
The statements also stated that the federal government was denied justice when the trial judge, Baba-Yusuf, set aside the provisions of ‘Certain Political, Public and Judicial Office Holders (Salaries and Allowances) Act, 2008’ amended, which prescribed only N5.8 million severance package, when he ruled in favour of Gwarzo.
It argued further that it was a mockery of justice for Baba-Yusuf to rule that the SEC board has all the powers to fix the severance package and other remunerations against extant laws of the land.
The statement alleged that the trial judge ignored obvious evidence before him, and deliberately avoided interpreting the document tendered by ICPC that showed only the payment of retirement and resignation benefits was permissible for political appointees that have spent two years and above in SEC.