Court jails college staff for six months

By Ise-Oluwa Ige
ABUJA—An Edo State high court sitting in Benin has convicted and sentenced Mrs. Adagun Mojisola Anita to six months imprisonment without an option of fine.

Adagun, a staff of the Federal Technical College Uromi, attached to the bursary department was arraigned before the court by the ICPC in August 2007 for receiving for herself the sum of N97, 810, 10 being salaries of Mrs. R.E Adebo (a former staff of the same institution) for the months of May and June 2004.

She concealed the crime by destroying the payment vouchers of the salaries of Mrs. Adebo.

She was charged alongside Mr. Balogun Akin Babatunde, the principal of the school who pleaded guilty to the charges brought against him and was later convicted earlier in the year.

In a related development, Justice A. N. Nwankwo of the High Court in Ebonyi State has discharged and acquitted Mr. Sunday Awol Adom of all the 19 count charges filed against him and two others.

Mr. Adom was the former Chairman of Ebonyi Local Government Council, he was alleged to have opened a separate account for the LGA after he was impeached and diverted the sum of N38 million into the account.

He was also alleged to have offered N500, 000 as bribe to two councillors in order to facilitate his return as the local government chairman.

He was investigated and arraigned before the court by the ICPC in May 2004 based on a petition from the then Secretary to the State Government of Ebonyi State, Dr I. A. Ituma.

The case lasted fiver years before the judgment.