The Federal High Court in Abuja has ordered former President Goodluck Jonathan to appear before it to testify as a witness in defence of Chief Olisa Metuh, former National Publicity Secretary of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP.
Metuh is currently facing trial for receiving a payment of N400 million from the Office of the former National Security Adviser, Sambo Dasuki in November 2014.
His lead counsel, Dr. Onyechi Ikpeazu (SAN), told the court on Monday that he would seek to subpoena Jonathan as a witness, after several witnesses who had testified claimed the money was directly authorised by Jonathan.
As reported by the Punch, Metuh’s legal team filed the draft subpoena before Justice Okon Abang shortly after the Monday’s proceedings, and it was approved by the judge.
However, Jonathan’s court appearance is dependent upon if the ex-president was served with the signed subpoena between Monday and Tuesday, a source, who spoke to the Punch said.
The source said: “I can authoritatively tell you that Metuh’s legal team filed the subpoena before the judge on Monday and the judge signed the subpoena promptly after the proceedings on Monday.
“The judge indicated in the subpoena that the former President should appear in court on Wednesday.
“But whether or not the former President would appear in court on Wednesday would be dependent on if the court bailiff will be able to serve him at his home in Abuja between Monday and the end of Tuesday.”
Metuh’s lawyer, Dr. Onyechi Ikpeazu (SAN), told the judge that he had written formally to Jonathan notifying him of his intention to have him testify in court but that the former President did not reply to his letter.
Ikpeazu said he demanded for subpoena to be issued on Jonathan after the detained former National Security Adviser, Sambo Dasuki, earlier summoned to testify as Metuh’s witness would have testified.
“We have another witness on subpoena, and at the end of the evidence of this another witness, we will take a decision on whether or not the first defendant (Metuh) will testify,” he said.
“The other witness we want to subpoena is Goodluck Jonathan, former President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
“We wrote him a letter but he did not respond and our plan will be to apply for the subpoena after the first application (for subpoena to be issued on Dasuki).”
Meanwhile, Dasuki who was scheduled to be the next to testify for the defence, was absent from court on Monday.
