Tobias Sylvester
The Nigeria Police Force has added more charges against Senator Ademola Adeleke of Osun West for conspiring with four others to procure illegal examination results.
The lawmaker had been facing charges of criminal conspiracy, personation, breach of duty, and aiding and abetting after he was arrested in July 2017 on suspicion of writing the National Examination Council (NECO) under false pretenses.
According to the Police, Senator Adeleke registered for NECO in 2017 by impersonating students of Ojo/Aro Community High School in Osun State. When he was arrested on July 27, 2017, he signed a statement admitting that he registered but did not sit for the examination.
However, according to a result obtained from NECO, Adeleke has seven credits and one pass in the examination he claimed he didn’t participate in. It was also discovered that in his application, he claimed he was born on June 12, 1997 (20 years old) even though he was 57 at the time.
The others who have been implicated in the scandal are Adeleke’s brother, Sikiru, principal of the school, Aregbesola Mufutau, the staff responsible for registration, Gbadamosi Thomas Ojo and a teacher, Dare Olutope.
Adeleke pleaded not guilty during arraignment before Justice I.E. Ekwo of the Federal High Court on October 31, 2018.
Today, Tuesday, December 18, 2018, During the resumption of the trial, the prosecution team increased the charges from four to seven.
The lawmaker has maintained that the trial is politically-motivated. The police had publicly invited him for questioning over the charges just days before the Osun governorship election for which he was contesting on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
In the face of the lawmaker’s defiance against a possible arrest warrant, the authorities stood down until after the elections which he controversially lost to the candidate of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
