Justice Babatunde Quadri of the Federal High Court sitting in Maitama, Abuja, has adjourned to December 21, 2018 for ruling on the authenticity or otherwise, of a medical report brought before the Court by a Chinese national, Li Ya Ping, who is seeking to travel out of Nigeria for medicals.
Ping is standing trial for a $300,000 (Three Hundred Thousand Dollars) money laundering charge after he was arrested at the International Airport for failing to declare the said sum of money in his possession, as he attempted to board a flight to Dubai.
His counsel, Patrick Ikwueto, SAN, had at a previous sitting, filed for a motion requesting for the withdrawal of an earlier application dated July 31, 2018 and filed on August 6, 2018 which sought for an order of the court in respect to the release of the defendant’s international passport, to enable him travel to China, for medical treatment. Annexed to the motion, was a medical report from Federal Medical Centre, FMC, Jabi.
However another application, dated August 16, 2018, brought before the Court, sought the withdrawal of the first motion, while consequently the third motion, dated August 20, 2018, continued in the pursuit of the release of the Chinese National’s International Passport to enable him travel to China for three weeks on medical grounds.
The judge said for the records that he will give both parties a fair level playing ground in a bid to entertain arguments from both counsels.
At the resumed hearing today, December 17, 2018, the learned silk prayed the court to grant the defendant’s application for medical treatment for a period before the next adjourned date stressing that his client will return the international passport which had been tendered as evidence in the course of the trial.
Prosecution counsel, Gbolahan Latona raised no objections to the withdrawal of the first motion just as the judge struck out the application.
(EFCC)