An attempt by Attorney General of the Federation (AGF) and Minister of Justice Lateef Fagbemi (SAN) to end a high-profile oil theft trial involving multinational oil trading giant Trafigura Beheer BV and Trafigura PTE Limited has been rejected by the Lagos State High Court in Ikeja, according to former Nigerian Bar Association President Joseph Daudu (SAN).
Daudu contended that the case was brought under the Lagos State Criminal Code Law (Cap. C17, 2003) and not the federal penal system when he appeared before Justice Mojisola Dada on Thursday on behalf of the nominal complainant, Nadabo Energy Limited.
Daudu declared that the AGF’s office’s notice of discontinuance was unlawful, citing a violation of Section 211(1) of the 1999 Constitution.
He asserts that because the prosecution started in Lagos State, the Attorney General of Lagos State, not the Federal Government, is solely responsible for it.
It was stated that following a plea by Trafigura’s attorney requesting that the Federal Government take up the case, the AGF, working through the Director of Public Prosecutions (DPP), had filed a notice of discontinuance.
But according to Daudu, the action was “ultra vires, null, void, and constitutionally defective.”
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He argued that this notification should be revoked because it is essentially defective and cloaked in ineptitude.
In the case (ID/7980c/2018), the Special Fraud Unit (SFU) claims that Trafigura and five other individuals misappropriated about $8,442,806.09 worth of Automotive Gas Oil (AGO) from Nadabo Energy.
Jil Engineering and Oil Services Ltd., Rembrandt Ltd., Osahon Asemota, Yusuf Kwande, and Mettle Energy and Gas are among the other defendants.
Prior to this, each defendant had entered a not guilty plea.
The prosecution had called 17 witnesses, and the trial had made substantial progress. The accused was ordered to launch their defense after Justice Dada rejected the defense’s no-case motion.
Instead of pursuing their defense, Trafigura’s legal team requested that the AGF end the case, which led to the contentious notice of discontinuation.
The notice was moved by the prosecution, and the defendants were later released by the judge.
In a previous case before Justice Sedotan Ogunsanya, the defendants were charged with similar crimes, according to Bode Olanipekun (SAN), Trafigura’s main attorney. He requested that the new case be dismissed on double jeopardy grounds.
However, Justice Dada rejected the application on the grounds that it lacked merit and found no connection between the two cases.
After a series of court rulings ordering the trial to begin, Trafigura’s lawyer started the defense and called three witnesses before requesting that the AGF take over the case, a move that Daudu vehemently resisted.
