Court Dismisses Certificate Forgery Suit Against Obaseki

A Federal High Court in Abuja on Saturday dismissed the alleged certificate forgery case filed against Governor Godwin Obaseki of Edo State by the All Progressives Congress and one of its members, Edobor Williams.

Delivering his judgment, Justice Ahmed Mohammed, held that the plaintiffs failed to prove their claim that Obaseki forged his academic certificates that he submitted to the Independent National Electoral Commission before the September 19 2019 governorship election in the state.

The judge found as lazy, the attitude of the plaintiffs, who did not make any efforts to cross-check from the University of Ibadan and the West African Examination Council the two institutions that issued the certificates they claimed Obaseki forged.

Justice Mohammed said there was no iota of evidence before the court to establish that Obaseki forged either his O’level certificate or the degree certificate that was awarded to him in 1979 by the University of Ibadan.

He held that allegation of forgery the Plaintiffs levelled against Obaseki bordered on crime and therefore required to be proved beyond reasonable doubt. “None of the witnesses called by the Plaintiffs was able to prove that the certificate as forged.

“In fact, the witnesses admitted that none of them visited the University of Ibadan to confirm the authenticity of the certificate.

“The Plaintiffs only relied on photocopies that were attached to the Form EC9 the 1st Defendant submitted to the Independent National Electoral Commission”, the court noted.

It held that apparent discrepancies in the documents Obaseki submitted to INEC, “were satisfactorily explained”.