Edo Impeachment: Panel Fixes Today for Final Adjournment, Shaibu, Counsel Absent

Adibe Emenyonu in Benin City

The seven-man panel set up by the Edo State Chief Judge (CJ), Justice Daniel Okungbowa, to investigate the allegation of perjury and leaking of government officials secrets levelled against the Deputy Governor of the state, Philip Shaibu, yesterday fixed today, Friday, April 5, for final adjournment to defend himself.
The panel arrived at the decision when it resumed its sitting yesterday but the deputy governor and his counsel were absent.
The chairman of the panel, Justice Stephen A Omonua (Rtd), said the panel would wait to see if the defendant would open his defence and thereafter called for the defendant

When it became apparent that the defendant, Shaibu, was absent and was not represented, Justice Omonua called for appearance for the plaintiff, the Edo State House of Assembly, which initiated the impeachment process.

N.U. Ibrahim, Legal Officer, Edo State House of Assembly, announced his appearance for the Assembly with two others.
The chairman then ruled that the panel would still adjourn to give the defendant the ample opportunity to appear before it to present his defense.
“This panel is adjourned for the last time to April 5, 2024 for the last time, at 12 noon, to allow the defendant to present his defense,” Justice Omonuwa ruled.
At the inaugural sitting of the panel on Wednesday, Shaibu’s counsel, Professor Oladoyin Awoyale (SAN), took the leave of the panel to excuse himself and the defendant from continuing with the pane’s proceedings.

Awoyale hinged his stance on his submission that all parties in the matter ought to obey the order of an Abuja Federal High Court which asked the parties to appear before it to show cause why it should or should not grant the enforcement of fundamental human rights prayer Shaibu tabled before the court.
While Awoyale (SAN) admitted his error before the panel that there was no injunction by the Abuja court restraining the panel as he had erroneously told the panel, he maintained that since the court had asked all the parties to come before it on Monday, April 8, 2024, the panel ought to obey that call.

But as the panel overruled his submission and upheld the argument of the counsel to the House of Assembly, Joe Ohiafi, that the continuation of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, as amended, foreclosed any court form stopping tue Assembly and the panel from carry out it’s constitutional responsibilities, the senior lawyer took his leave of the panel.