The Gombe State High Court Four, presided over by Justice Haruna Kerengs, has acquitted Senator Danjuma Goje’s Social Media aide, Muhammadu Yayari, of the fake post charges against him.
Yayari had been facing trial over a case brought by the Attorney General of Gombe State for posting that 85 percent of the All Progressives Congress executive members in the Yamaltu Deba Local Government Area of the state had resigned, a post which the APC and government officials frowned upon, saying that it was malicious and fake news.
Punch newspaper reported that he was granted bail by Chief Magistrate Suleiman Kumo of the Chief Magistrate Court Four, Pantami, after days of detention at the custodial centre.
The High Court judge quashed the trial, describing it as null and void.
According to him, merely posting to the social media that people have resigned their appointment was not an offence known to law.
He said, “Secondly, the proceedings conducted before the Chief Magistrate Court Four, Pantami, and transferred to the Chief Magistrate Court 11, was a nullity and hereby quashed.
“Thirdly, that the letter of transfer by the Chief Registrar of the Gombe State High Court from the Chief Magistrate Court Four to the Chief Magistrate Court 11 is also a nullity, especially when there was no fair hearing given to the applicant, and is hereby quashed,” said Justice Kerengs.
The lead counsel for the applicant, Haruna Lukas, said the rule of law has succeeded and the judiciary has again becomes the bastion of hope for the common man.
On the prayer that was not granted by the court, Lukas said the legal team would go and carefully study the ruling of the court on it and decide on the next line of action.
“The ruling is saying that the police cannot be stopped from performing their constitutional duties. Yes, it is true, the police have to maintain their constitutional duties and part of their constitutional duties is being unbiased and fair to everybody.
“They cannot choose the state against its citizens. The citizens make the state, the citizens are the government and the citizens are the employers of the people that manage state resources. So citizen must be accorded their due respect impartially,” he said.
Lukas appealed to those who were being persecuted for posting something against the government on social media to continue, he added, “they should stand upright and courageous and challenge whatever decision of the state against them before the court of law.”
