A civil rights group, Accountable Leadership for Better Nigeria (ALBNI) has accused the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) of bias and injustice in the matter involving the Chief Medical Director of the University College Hospital, Ibadan, Professor Jesse Otegbayo.
ALBNI in a statement issued in Abuja on Wednesday by its Executive Director, Remi Adebayo, also alleged that filing fresh charges against Otegbayo on a matter he was already reprimanded and the issue long resolved by the Federal Ministry of Health and the House of Representatives amounts to contravention of the law, grave injustice, and double jeopardy.
“ALBNI believes that filing fresh charges against Otegbayo on a matter he was already reprimanded and the issue long resolved by the Federal Ministry of Health and the House of Representatives, amounts to a contravention of the law, grave injustice, and double jeopardy.
“Specifically, the organization is curious that the charge sheet which alleged unlawful recruitment of workers, signed by one Agbili Ezenwa of the ICPC Head Office, Abuja, was prepared on 7 February 2020 but filed three years after on 20 February 2023.
“We at ALBNI view the three-count charge filed at the Federal High Court in Ibadan, which was improperly served on Prof Otegbayo in Abuja. This action amounted to double jeopardy because the alleged offence of the CMD had been ‘punished’ by the Federal Ministry of Health which in August 2021 issued him a “letter of reprimand for unauthorized employment.
“ALBNI is even worried that those who seek to persecute Prof. Otegbayo for administrative oversight also benefited from the alleged offence. Information at our disposal indicates that the Office of the Head of Service, the Budget Office of the Federation, and ICPC officials sent lists of candidates to the UCH for employment in the said recruitment exercise.
“Also, in a protest letter, the lawyer to Prof. Otegbayo, Mr. Olaniyi Okin counseled the ICPC to respect the provisions of the 1999 Constitution, which prohibits exposing a Nigerian citizen to double jeopardy.”
