Baba Ijesha, the embattled actor, has dropped plans to file
a no-case submission in his trial on alleged s3.xual assault.
Baba Ijesha is charged with six counts of indecent treatment
of a child, sexual assault, attempted sexual assault by penetration and sexual
assault by penetration.
He is undergoing trial before an Ikeja special offences
court.
According to NAN, Kayode Olabiran, the defence counsel, had
in December informed the court that the defendant had no case to answer and
intends to file a no-case submission at the next court date.
However, during Tuesday proceedings, A.O Alo, a defence
counsel, informed the court that the defence team had made a change of plans
after a review of the case with the defendant.
“The defendant after the review has decided to put in his
defence and we have decided not to file the no-case submission again,” he said.
“In view of this, we will be humbly praying that the court
should give us a short adjournment.”
Oluwatoyin Taiwo, the judge, queried the request of the
defence counsel for an adjournment, adding that there was sufficient time from
the last proceedings on December 15, 2021, to prepare a defence.
She said that Baba Ijesha should enter the witness box to
commence his defence.
In his reaction, Alo revealed that it was his first time
appearing in court for the case despite being from the law firm of Dada Awosika
(SAN), one of the lead defence counsel.
“My lord, the learned silk is indisposed. The other lead
defence counsel, Mr Babatunde Ogala, SAN, has also communicated to the court
that he will is also indisposed,” he said.
Opposing the request for adjournment, Babajide
Martins, director of public prosecution (DPP), described the excuse of the
defence counsel as “quite unfortunate”.
Martins said, as the recently appointed DPP, he is also
appearing before the court for the first time.
He also said there was no law for conditional representation
and once a lawyer appears before a court, it is presumed that he carries out
his legal representation duties to the letter.
In her ruling, the judge said she will be giving the two
SANs who represent Baba Ijesha the benefit of the doubt.
“This case is
adjourned until February 17 and 18 at 1 pm for defence,” she added.
Advertise on NigerianEye.com to reach thousands of our daily users
No comments
Post a Comment
Kindly drop a comment below.
(Comments are moderated. Clean comments will be approved immediately)
Advert Enquires - Reach out to us at NigerianEye@gmail.com