by Rachel Ogbu

Abbas Faggo, 30-year old civil servant, was arraigned before a magistrate court over alleged injurious falsehood and defamation after he allegedly posted details of ‘monumental corruption’ in Bauchi State on Facebook.

The prosecution accused Faggo of using his mobile telephone to send a message to his Facebook profile on September 4, alleging that the state funded the wedding of the state governor’s son, which took place at the Azare area of the state on September 8.

Faggo had a post on his Facebook anbout the alleged extravagant funding of Governor Yuguda’s son, Idris’ wedding. The case generated comments from over 500 people, including politicians, the Civil Liberties Organisation, CLO, prompting the Nigerian Bar Association, NBA, to indicated interest in defending the accused person.

Police prosecutor, Sergeant Mohammed Gaba, had earlier told the Court III, that the state Police Criminal Investigation Department, SCID, received a request from the state Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice, Al-Mustapha Suleiman, to investigate the offence against Faggo, which was contrary to Sections 393 and 394 of the Penal Code.

Yesterday, counsel from different organisations led by Chairman of NBA in Bauchi State, Mohammed Alhassan, announced appearance for Faggo.

At first Garba told the court that the police left the accused behind, a situation which the defense counsel opposed.

The presiding magistrate,  ordered the police to bring the accused within 90 minutes and they did.
In his ruling, the presiding Magistrate, Adamu Madaki granted bail to Faggo.
According to the bail conditions, Faggo must produce two sureties, who must sign a bond of N500,000 each and then adjourned the case to November 15, to enable the prosecution get lawyer to address the issues raised by the defence that had obviously rendered the charges on the First Information Report, FIR defective.