The Nigerian Immigration Service (NIS) on Friday told a Federal High Court sitting in Abuja that it replaced the lost passport of Justice Sylvester Ngwuta of the Supreme Court because the organisation had no cause to doubt the affidavit deposed to by the Justice wherein he deposed to the loss of his passport.
The Federal Government is prosecuting Justice Ngwuta over alleged corruption.
At the resumed trial yesterday, Prosecution Witness Five, Tanko Kutana, said a new passport was issued to Justice Ngwuta by the immigration, having been convinced that he actually lost the first one.
The witness, however, informed the court that the judge did not report back to the immigration when he allegedly found his missing passport.
Kutana, under cross examination by the defense counsel, Kanu Agabi SAN, the court that the immigration rules made allowance for genuine mistake, but in the instant case the defendant cannot be said to have made a genuine mistake.
The witness further informed the court, that his forensic report showed that Justice Ngwuta was using the two standard passport interchangeable, at the time of his arrest on October 7, 2016 by the operatives of the Department of State Security.
Kutana said ordinarily the defendant ought to have returned the recovered passport to the immigration when it was found.
The witness who confirmed that four diplomatic passports and two standard passports were found in the possession of the defendant said that his forensic analysis on the six passports did not show evidence of forgery
“I did the analysis on the six passports to determine whether there was forgery and by the time I concluded my analysis of the passports, I found no evidence of forgery in any of them,” he said.
He admitted that he did not meet or interrogate the defendant during the cause of his analysis, so as to obtain his own side of the story, because it was not needed.
He said: “There are circumstances under which a citizen can have more than one passport, but not two same passports at the same time as in the instant case.
“I ascribe illegality on the two standard passports found with the defendant, because the defendant ought to have returned one of the passports to the immigration.”
The trial judge, Justice John Tsoho later adjourned to October 20 at the instance of the prosecution.