There is confusion over the final
report of the police investigation into the alleged forgery of the Senate
Standing Orders 2015 with conflicting claims by both the police and the justice
ministry on the status of the report.
While the police insisted on
Tuesday that they had sent the report to the Ministry of Justice for possible
prosecution of suspects, the ministry official said the report had not been
received.
A source however confided in The
PUNCH that the police had yet to return the report to the ministry.
The allegedly forged 2015 edition
of the Senate Standing Orders was used for the conduct of the election of
Bukola Saraki and Ike Ekweremadu, as Senate President and Deputy Senate
President respectively, shortly after the proclamation of the 8th Senate on
June 9, 2015.
The police had sent an initial
report to the office of the Attorney General of the Federation for proper legal
advice but the AGF office had sent the report back to the police, asking them
to conduct a better investigation of the allegation.
In the initial report, the police
confirmed that “some group of senators” criminally amended the Senate Standing
Orders 2011 to produce the 2015 edition.
But the Directorate of Public
Prosecutions of the Federal Ministry of Justice had sought for more information
on the senators that allegedly amended the document.
The whereabouts of the final
police report now appears unknown.
While several sources in the
ministry confirmed to one of our correspondents on Tuesday that the police had
yet to respond to the request for further investigation, the police on the
other hand claimed that they had responded to the ministry’s inquiry.
“The police have not responded to
the inquiry by the ministry and the DPP yet. If they have responded, maybe
their response is on its way,” a top ministry source told one of our
correspondents on Tuesday.
Another lawyer in the ministry
had told The PUNCH on Monday that the ministry had yet to hear from the police
on the status of the report.
“We have written to the police
but we have not heard from them,” the lawyer said.
But the Police Public Relations
Officer, Mr. Emmanuel Ojukwu, told one of our correspondents on Tuesday that
the police had responded to the ministry’s inquiry.
“We have sent to them (Ministry
of Justice) the letter; I can’t remember the exact day but I’m sure we have
sent it and we have been cooperating with them to ensure speedy prosecution of
the case,” the police spokesman said.
When contacted on Tuesday, the
Director of Information in the justice ministry, Mr. Charles Nwodo, said he was
not aware of any development on the case.
“I don’t know anything about the
case,”’ he said.
The PUNCH had on August 4
exclusively reported that the grey areas, which the ministry was seeking
clarification on from the police, included information on the “group of
senators” involved in the illegal amendment.
The 13-page police report had
reportedly confirmed that the amendment of the 2011 version of the Senate
Standing Orders to produce the 2015 edition was “criminally done” as it was
carried out by only a group of senators.
The police report, however,
failed to indict any particular person and also did not recommend anybody for
prosecution.
The Deputy Inspector-General of
Police, Dan’Azumi Doma, who was said to have signed the report, had recommended
that the report be forwarded to the AGF to determine whether a crime had been
committed or whether the alleged offence could be regarded as an internal
affair of the Senate.
The forgery allegation arose from
a petition by Senator Sulaiman Hunkuyi of the All Progressives Congress from
Kaduna State.
The petitioner had alleged that
some parts of the 2015 Senate Orders were different from the one ratified by
the 6th Senate in 2010, which was used by the 7th Senate, as Standing Orders
2011.
The police, in the course of
their investigation, had on July 6 questioned some members of the 7th and the
8th Senates as well as some management employees of the Senate, including the
Clerk of the National Assembly, Alhaji Salisu Maikasuwa.
A study of the controversial 2015
Senate Standing Orders, Rule 3, as contained on page four of the document,
which has to do with the election of presiding officers, showed that it was
different from the 2011 Senate Standing Orders.
Rules 3(e) (i) and (ii) had been
included in the 2015 document to accommodate electronic voting and secret
ballot, whereas secret ballot and ballot papers were not specifically mentioned
in the 2011 Standing Orders.
Copyright PUNCH.
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