A KANO high court has barred the Independent Corrupt Practices Commission (ICPC), Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB) from interrogating the chairman of the Kano Public Complaints and Anti-Corruption Commission (PCACC) Muhyi Rimingado.
This resulted from the anti-fraud agencies inviting the PCACC and its officials to respond to inquiries on the commission’s operations from 2011 to date.
The federal government was brought before the court by the Kano state government for what it claimed to be harassment and intimidation of the PCACC by three federal agencies.
In an ex parte order, the sitting judge, Farouk Adamu, instructed the federal agencies and their officers to stop interviewing or looking into the Kano state anti-graft agency.
The agencies were also told by the court to stop interfering with the operations of the Kano anti-graft organisation.
All parties to the case were further urged to maintain the status quo by the order with suit number N0 K/M1128/2023.
“And after hearing Mr H. I. Dederi Esq (Attorney General of Kano State) of Counsel for the Applicant, it is hereby ordered that all parties maintain status quo antebellum.
“Order is hereby included by way of Interim Injunction restraining the defendants/respondents from meddling or delving into the affairs or taking any step on, related to or in connection with the functions, duties and affairs of the plaintiffs/applicants,” the order reads.
Similarly, the judge, Adamu shortened the window of time in which the Defendants might submit and serve their separate court documents to expedite the case’s hearing.
The Kano State Attorney General, the Kano State Public Complaints and Anti-Corruption Commission, and its Chairman, Muhuyi Magaji Rimingado, are the plaintiffs in the lawsuit. At the same time, the respondents are the ICPC, CCB, and EFCC.
However, the judge postponed the case until the originating motion hearing on September 25, 2023.
Following the court’s directive, Rimingado asserted that the commission would not be deterred from carrying out its legitimate responsibilities by any amount of intimidation or smear campaign.
The ICIR reported that the PCACC summoned former governor Abdullahi Ganduje for interrogation over a contentious video where the former governor was seen accepting dollars from a contractor in 2017.
Chairman of the Commission, Rimingado, had on Wednesday, June 5, declared that, contrary to Ganduje’s claims, the video was not doctored.
Rimingado spoke at a ‘One Day Public Dialogue on Anti-Corruption Crusade’ in Kano.
In a video that went viral in 2017, Ganduje was seen receiving bundles of dollar notes offered as bribe from a contractor and stuffing them in his dress.
Rimingado claimed that since the video’s release, he has come under pressure from all sides to establish the governor’s guilt or innocence.
He explained that because Ganduje was immune from prosecution during his time in office, it had been hard to establish his guilt or innocence since the committee started looking into the issue in 2018.
A reporter with the ICIR
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