A Federal High Court in Abuja turned down two sets of documents that politician and online publisher Omoyele Sowore had submitted in his ongoing prosecution for cyberstalking.
The Department of State Services (DSS) is prosecuting Sowore for allegedly lying about President Bola Tinubu by calling him a criminal in a post he made on his “X” and Facebook accounts.
Justice Mohammed Umar turned down an oral request from Sowore’s lawyer, Marshall Abubakar, to let a group of papers, including printouts of publications, be used as evidence in the first ruling yesterday, according to Daily Independent.
The articles talk about the DSS firing 115 officials for bad behavior, the EFCC charging five former governors with corruption, the EFCC firing 27 of its own employees for fraud and misconduct, and the EFCC arresting some former NNPCL employees for stealing N7.2 billion.
Justice Umar agreed with the prosecuting lawyer, Akinlolu Kehinde (SAN), that the defendant should present the documents during his defense.
The judge said that Abubakar couldn’t use the first prosecution witness (PW1) to submit the documents since the witness said he didn’t know anything about the publications in them.
“You can’t give a document to a witness who said he didn’t know anything about it.”
Justice Umar replied, “The document is marked as rejected.”
The judge turned down another set of documents in the second ruling. These documents were printouts of articles that Abubakar said showed that President Bola Tinubu had called then-President Goodluck Jonathan a drunkard and a sinking fisherman in 2011, and that he had also called former President Olusegun Obasanjo “expired meat.”
The judge noted the documents that were turned down for the identical reason he stated for turning down the first set of documents.
Justice Umar frowned at the prosecuting lawyer’s assertion that a member of the defense team had live-streamed previous events in the case and asked the court to launch an investigation to find out who did it.
Abubakar added that no one on the defense team was engaged and that it may have been done by the DSS or persons in the administration. The judge ruled that this constituted contempt of court.
Abubakar asked the court to just warn against a repeat of the event and not to order an investigation, as the prosecuting lawyer had asked.
Justice Umar stated it was easy to find out who was responsible for the event and that he could tell security authorities to look into it because it was a serious concern.
The judge said he will look at the video that got out.
During cross-examination, Cyril Nosike, an official of the DSS, revealed that at the time Sowore posted the tweet that led to his arrest, President Tinubu’s official X (Twitter) handle was @officialABAT.
The witness did not agree with Abubakar that the President’s official X handle is @PBAT.
Nosike stated he didn’t bring any court decisions before the court to prove that corruption has ended in Nigeria.
The witness stated he is not a politician and cannot comment on whether there is corruption in Nigeria. He also added that the defense lawyer was only asking for his opinion and that he was only there to provide the facts.
He disagreed with Abubakar’s claim that the DSS fired 115 of its employees for corruption, saying that they were fired following an internal probe and not because of corruption, as the defense lawyer said.
The witness said they didn’t know that the EFCC charged five former governors with corruption in 2025, that the EFCC detained former employees of the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL) for fraud worth N7.2 billion, or that the EFCC fired 27 of its own personnel for fraud and misconduct.
When asked if he knows about the worldwide corruption ranking as a security officer, the witness stated he does not. He also indicated he doesn’t know about the corruption index from Transparency International.
The witness also said he didn’t know that Nigeria is ranked 140th out of 180 countries in the global corruption ranking.
Witness stated he didn’t know if the current president was a prominent opposition figure in the country in 2011.
The witness stated he doesn’t know if the present president branded then-President Goodluck Jonathan corrupt and disgusting in 2011.
Nosike also said he doesn’t know that the present President branded Jonathan a drinker and a fisherman who is going down.
The witness said yes when asked if he knew former President Olusegun Obasanjo. He did say, though,
He doesn’t know that President Tinubu dubbed former President Obasanjo “expired meat.”
The witness stated he would be shocked if he saw papers that said Tinubu said those things about the two former presidents.
When asked if he knew the name Femi Fani Kayode, who is currently an ambassador designate, the witness responded yes, but he couldn’t remember that Fani Kayode had been a vociferous critic of the President before he was nominated as ambassador.
Nosike said he didn’t know about Abubakar’s claim that Fani Kayode posted on social media saying that President Tinubu knew anything about the killing of Funso Williams, who was running for governor in Lagos State.
The witness stated he didn’t know that the DSS had screened Fani Kayode as an ambassador designate because it wasn’t on his calendar.
Nosike stated he couldn’t remember that Funso Williams was killed in Lagos while President Tinubu was the state’s governor.
He said he knew Chief Reno Omokri and that Omokri is an ambassador-designate chosen by this government.
The witness claimed he doesn’t know about Omokri’s social media post suggesting that Tinubu knows about Funso Williams’ murder. He also stated he hasn’t seen any videos of Omokri saying that Tinubu knows about Funso Williams’ death.
The witness stated he didn’t know that Omokri conducted a rally in London against President Tinubu, saying that the President was involved in drug trafficking and knew about Funso Williams’ murder.
Justice Umar asked Abubakar when he was going to finish with the witness after spending one hour and 40 minutes cross-examining him. Abubakar had already cross-examined the witness for two days.
Abubakar asked the court for one more day, saying he needed to ask the witness more critical questions and show them additional papers.
Kehinde said that Abubakar had asked for an extra hour to finish on the last date, although he had already spent an hour and 40 minutes and still said he wasn’t done with the witness.
Kehinde said he would rather let the judge decide if the defense should get the delay they want.
Justice Umar said that this is the second day the defense has started cross-examining the PW1.
The judge also said that Abubakar had asked for one hour on the last date, but he has already spent one hour and forty minutes and asked for another date.
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