The Code of Conduct trial of Senate President, Bukola Saraki, on Tuesday, turned into a comic show as series of events unfolded while the presiding judge, Danladi Umar, behaved erratically.
First was the mix-up of the false asset declaration trials of Saraki and that of former Minister of Niger Delta Affairs, Godsday Orubebe, which came up on the same day.
This led to a mild face-off between Orubebe’s lawyer and Justice Umar.
The presiding judge had initially arrived an hour late to the trial which he had scheduled to begin at 10 am.
As Saraki’s trial began, the first witness, Micheal Wetkas, an operative of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), was called for cross-examination by the defense council, Paul Usoro (SAN).
Midway into the cross-examination, Usoro had to remind the presiding judge – who kept interfering – that he wasn’t the one giving testimony hence he should stop answering unasked questions.
While querying Wetkas on the usage of credit and debit cards, Usoro asked if he owned a debit card, and he responded saying that he didn’t.
At this point, Justice Umar interjected and began explaining to the Tribunal what a credit card was.
He was, however, interrupted by Usoro, who stated that: “Thank you for that explanation my lord. The only problem that I have here is that my lord is not the one on the witness stand.”
This caused ripples of laughter in the courtroom as the Tribunal chairman adjourned the court-sitting for 15 minutes.
