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THE federal government on Sunday, February 12, said Charles Adeogun-Philips, SAN, its lead prosecutor in the trial of Justice Sylvester Ngwuta of the Supreme court, was disengaged over non-disclosure of conflict of interest and other sundry reasons.

Salisu Isah, head of Communications, National Prosecution Coordination Committee, NPCC, who disclosed this in a statement, said the committee, which engaged him for the job, wrote him in a letter, dated February 6, 2017, disengaging him.

The letter was signed by Sylvester Imhanobe, secretary of the NPCC. The statement by Isah, therefore, said: “Contrary to impressions given by Charles Adeogun-Philips, the lead prosecutor in the suit against Supreme Court judge, Justice Sylvester Nwali Ngwuta, in various reports suggesting that he withdrew from the case on his own volition, the National Prosecution Coordination Committee, NPCC, that engaged his services actually withdrew the fiat issued to him to prosecute the case over non disclosure of conflict of interest and for other sundry reasons. Charles Adeogun-Philips

‘’The reports in a section of the media last Friday (February 10) that he left in protest due to last week Tuesday’s dropping of charges earlier instituted against the Chief Registrar of the Supreme Court, Ahmed Gambo Saleh and two other officials of the apex court, Muhammad Abdulrahman Sharif and Rilwanu Lawal which he is also handling for the Federal Government and withdrawn against his consent; cannot be relied upon. “The insinuation that the HAGF withdrew the case against the three Supreme Court officials because they are Northerners is also unwarranted due to the fact that the dropping of the suit was done in good faith and in the context of plea bargaining to achieve greater goals in the prosecution of the other bigger cases that are ongoing against Justice Sylvester Ngwuta among others.”

—  Feb 13, 2017 @ 16:50 GMT

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