Some Aba residents in Abia State have lauded the 12-year jail term handed down to ex-Governor Orji Kalu of the State, by a Federal High Court in Lagos yesterday.
\nOur correspondent reports that Justice Mohammed Idris convicted Kalu on 39 counts of N7.2 billion fraud and money laundering preferred against him by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission.
\nAba is the main base of Kalu \u2013 now a senator \u2013 and some of the residents said that the judgment was a warning to political office holders to be careful.
\nA lawyer and social critic, Chief Ukpai Ukairo told our correspondent: \u201cThe judgment is momentous and shows that you can run but cannot hide.
\n\u201cThe judgment shows that though the wheel of justice grinds slowly, it will surely grind very well.
\n\u201cThis is the time for Abia to recover money stolen by that regime and use it meaningfully.
\n\u201cIt is also a warning to all those in positions of authority that abuse the trust of the people.\u201d
\nHe urged that assets of Slok Nig. Ltd. \u2013 Kalu\u2019s company \u2013 should be forfeited to Abia Government and not Federal Government.
\nA chieftain of the People\u2019s Democratic Party in Abia, Chief Okey Nwagbara, on his part, lauded the judgment, saying that it demonstrated the commitment of the Federal Government to fight corruption.
\nHe added that the judgment showed that the All Progressives Congress-led Federal Government was not selective in its crusade against corruption.
\n\u201cIt is a very straight-forward judgment against corruption.
\n\u201cThe judgment shows that the judiciary is independent and actually the hope of the common man.
\n\u201cI learnt that the court ruled that the property of Slok, Orji Kalu\u2019s company, should be forfeited to the Federal Government.
\n\u201cI want the Federal Government to do justice by converting the property of Slok to Abia Government\u2019s, because the money he was accused of stealing, is Abia State Government\u2019s,\u201d he said.
\nMr Uche Emeku of the Easy Life Initiative for Rural Youths (ELIRY) said that the judgment showed that the judiciary could act independently.
\n\u201cIt is not about Orji Kalu but sanity in our polity as long as it is not done with prejudice.
\n\u201cI believe everybody who commits a crime should be punished for the crime he committed.
\n\u201cEverybody should be very careful because it is about dispensing justice by those in the temple of justice,\u201d he said.
\nMeanwhile, the Coalition of United Political Parties, CUPP, has called on the former governor of Abia State and senator representing Abia North, Orji Uzor Kalu, to resign his position as the Chief Whip of the Senate because of his conviction, yesterday by a Federal High Court sitting in Lagos.
\nCUPP said the conviction of Senator Kalu over alleged N7.65 billion has made him ineligible to continue to function as in that capacity.
\nThe coalition in a statement, yesterday , by its spokesman, Ikenga Ugochinyere, insisted that while he pursues his conviction in a higher court, it was proper for him to abdicate his office in the upper legislative chamber as Chief Whip.
\nThe statement tagged: \u201cOrji Kalu\u2019s conviction and continued to stay in office as Senate\u2019s principal officer\/Chief Whip\u201d, said the case would be a\u201d Test case for the All Progressives Congress, APC\u2019s anti-corruption fight.\u201d
\nThe statement by CUPP read thus:\u201d President Muhanmadu Buhari-led All Progressives Congress government wanted Senator Bukola Saraki and Justice Walter Onnogen to resign from their positions of Senate President and Chief Justice of Nigeria respectively even when there was no conviction.
\n\u201cThe government based its demand than on the ground that there were allegations levelled against these two former top government officials and charges instituted against them in different courts.
\n\u201cNow that the Senate Chief Whip, Orji Uzor Kalu, who is among the principal officers imposed on the Nigerian Senate by the Buhari-led APC government has been convicted by a court of competent jurisdiction based on corruption charges, we join Nigerians in watching to see what will happen to Kalu.
\n\u201cWill Kalu, a convict based on the court\u2019s verdict, continue to function as the Senate\u2019s Chief Whip under a government who claims to be fighting corruption?
\n\u201cCan the Buhari\u2019s APC and the senators have the balls to ask him to resign as a principal officer while pursuing his appeal as an ordinary senator?
\n\u201cLet us see if the Buhari\u2019s corruption fight is just a weapon for hunting perceived opponents or a serious fight to restore honour and credibility to governance.
\n\u201cWe are fully aware that the man has a right to appeal his conviction.
\n\u201cAlso, we are not asking that they ask him to resign as a senator as he has a right to stay until his appeal is concluded.
\n\u201cWhat we are asking is if the Buhari\u2019s APC can pressure him to step down as a principal officer of the Senate and continue pursuing his appeal to clear himself.
\n\u201cAs Orji Kalu goes to prison today, will he take the office with him to prison under a government that claims to be morally upright or will be getting injunction pending appeal etc?\u201d
\nRecall that the Federal High Court in Lagos earlier, yesterday , sentenced the former governor of Abia State Senator Orji Uzor Kalu to 12 years imprisonment after being found guilty on all the 39-count charges brought against him.
\nHe was convicted of N7.65billion fraud perpetuated when he was Abia State governor between 1999 and 2007.
\nKalu was convicted alongside his firm, Slok Nigeria Limited and his former Abia State director of finance, Ude Udeogu.
\nThe court also ordered forfeiture of all assets of his company to the federal government.
\nJustice Mohammed Idris, who delivered the sentence, had earlier declared him guilty of the charge in the case that had been on for 12 years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Some Aba residents in Abia State have lauded the 12-year jail term handed down to ex-Governor Orji Kalu of the State, by a Federal High Court in Lagos yesterday. Our correspondent reports that Justice Mohammed Idris convicted Kalu on 39 counts of N7.2 billion fraud and money laundering preferred against him by the Economic and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":161036,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[16],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-222457","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222457","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=222457"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/222457\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/161036"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=222457"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=222457"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetidenewsonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=222457"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}