A Dutse Magistrates’ Court has sentenced one Sabi’u Ibrahim Chamo to six- month imprisonment for insulting and defaming Governor Muhammadu Badaru Abubakar’s character on Facebook.

The Chief Magistrates’ Court 1 sitting in Dutse and presided over by Batula Dauda gave Chamo an alternative of N20,000 fine with 20 strokes of cane for defaming the governor.

Chamo was first arrested on Christmas Eve and detained before he was charged to court for failure to substantiate the allegations he made on Facebook.

The police prosecutor told the court that he was arraigned over an allegation he made that the governor defrauded many All Progressives Congress (APC) aspirants by collecting money to give them party tickets.

The convicted critic pleaded guilty to the charge and the court sentenced him to six months in prison, with alternative to pay N20,000 as fine and 20 strokes of the cane to serve as a deterrent to others.

In June 2017, a critic of the governor, Zakari Kafin Hausa, was arrested and detained for several days for criticizing the governor on social media.

In a statement by the Public Relations Officer, Ministry of Justice, Mrs Zainab Baba Santali, the fact of the case was that Sabi’u Chamo had made a post on his Facebook page and made a malicious statement about the governor. During the trial, after the first information was read to the defendant, he pleaded guilty to the offence and the court sentenced him.

Meanwhile, a 45-year-old self-acclaimed pastor, Mayowa Abolaji, who allegedly defrauded a woman of N10 million, appeared in an Ikeja Magistrates’ Court yesterday.

The police charged Abolaji with three counts of conspiracy, obtaining money under false pretence and theft.

The defendant, however, pleaded not guilty to the charges. The prosecution counsel, ASP Ezekiel Ayorinde, told the court that the defendant and others yet to be apprehended committed the offence between 2015 and 2018 at Alakuko and Ogba in Lagos.

He said the defendant obtained N10 million from Mrs Teni Yakubu, with a promise to solve her childlessness in marriage, a representation he knew to be false.

“The defendant approached the complainant, who had been married for years without a child, under the pretext of providing spiritual solution to her barrenness. He induced the complainant with charms and collected N10 million through the accounts of Isiaka Akinola and Aderonke Olawale, who are still at large.”

The prosecutor said the offence contravened the provisions of sections 287, 314 and 411 of the Criminal Law of Lagos State, 2015. Section 287 prescribes three years’ jail term for stealing while section 314 attracts 15 years for obtaining money under false pretence.

Magistrate O.A. Layinka admitted the defendant to bail in the sum of N2 million with two sureties in like sum. Layinka ordered that the sureties must be gainfully employed and show evidence of two-year tax payment to the Lagos State Government.

She adjourned the case till February 18, 2021. (Text, excluding headline, courtesy The Guardian)

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