TheCable

David Parradang, former comptroller-general of Nigeria Immigration Service (NIS), on Wednesday told a federal high court, Abuja, that he only read about the recruitment exercise conducted in 2014 on the pages of newspaper.

Out of the 6.5 million people who applied for the 4000 vacant positions, 16 were confirmed dead as a result of overcrowding, stampede, and exhaustion which occurred in virtually all the locations (36 states and the federal capital territory) of the recruitment.

But speaking at the commencement of the trial of Abba Moro, former interior minister, Parradang, the first prosecution witness, said he was shocked when he saw reports of the recruitment in a newspaper.

“In September, I was referred to a publication in one of the dailies that NIS was recruiting officers into assistant superintendent cadre, inspectorate and assistant inspectorate cadre,” he said.

“I was surprised about the recruitment exercise because as a comptroller-general, I was not aware of it.”

Parradang further told the court that he called two board members to ask whether they were aware of the recruitment, but they too said they were in the dark.

At this point, the defendants objected to his evidence, saying that it was mere hearsay.

In his objection, Chris Uche, Moro’s counsel, said by rules of evidence a witness could not give evidence as to what he was told but only on what he knows.

Aliyu Yusuf, prosecuting counsel, attempted to tender a letter written by the comptroller-general to the board as evidence but this too was also objected to by the defence.

Yusuf, however, said the document was admissible because relevance determines admissibility of a document.

Paul Irokoro, defence counsel, said even though the document was certified, without the prescribed fee paid, it could not be tendered in evidence.

Nnamdi Dimgba, the judge, ordered a strict case management approach.

Dimgba ordered the prosecution and the defence to meet, harmonise and agree on documents to be relied on to reduce the time spent on legal arguments over admissibility of documents.

He adjourned the case till June 10 to rule on the objection raised by the defence and continuation of trial.

Moro was arraigned on an 11-count charge of advance fee fraud, money laundering and breach of public procurement act to the tune of N676.6 million.

He was arraigned alongside Anastasia Nwobia, former permanent secretary of the ministry, F.O. Alayebami and Drexel Tech Nigeria Limited.

Moro, who was granted bail on self-recognition, was accused of defrauding 676, 675 applicants of N676, 675, 000, being the aggregate of N1000 paid by each applicant to Drexel ahead of the NIS recruitment.