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| Umar Dikko |
Justice Nnamdi Dimgba of a Federal High Court, Abuja, has adjourned the N9.7 billion fraud trial of a former Chief of Air Staff, Air Marshal Umar Dikko, to Thursday, February 28, 2019.
Dikko is being prosecuted by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, on a seven-count charge bordering on money laundering and procurement fraud.
He is alleged to have withdrawn N700 million from the account of the Nigeria Air Force, NAF, between September 2010 and 2012, which he used to purchase a house at No. 14 Vistula Close, off Panama Street in Maitama, Abuja.
He is also alleged to have fraudulently withdrawn N500 million from the NAF account to buy a four-bedroom duplex at Road 3B, Street 2, in Mabushi Ministers Hill, Abuja. Additionally, the former NAF boss allegedly took N250million from the NAF’s coffers to buy a property at No. 14, Audu Bako Way, GRA, Kano State in 2011.
At the resumed sitting, today, February 27, 2019, prosecuting counsel, Sylvanus Tahir, told the Court that a prosecution witness who was slated to testify, was indisposed, and was currently on admission at a hospital in Kano.
“I have called the learned silk for the defence and explained my predicament to him, and I therefore plead with your lordship to adjourn the matter,” he said.
Lead counsel for the defence, Hassan Liman, SAN, raised no objections to the application for an adjournment.
Justice Dimgba, thereafter, adjourned to February 28, 2019.
