Kashamu panics over FG’s bid to extradite him to USA on allleged drug offence

Senator who represented Ogun East Senatorial District in the Eighth Senate, Prince Buruji Kashamu has again rushed to the Supreme Court praying for an order of interim injunction to stop the Federal Government from extraditing him to the United States of America (USA) until the final determination of his appeal pending before the court.

Kashamu filed two separate motions at the Supreme Court seeking an order of protection in his favour to enable him to enjoy some respite pending the final decision on his extradition legal battle.

Kashamu, in the motions, feared that the Federal Government will ferry him to America for trial in an alleged hard drug trafficking offence unless the order of injunction is granted to shield him.

In the motions filed in his behalf by Dr Alex Izinyon (SAN), Kashamu claimed that he has become aware that the Federal Government might pick him up and extradite him to America in spite of his pending appeal at the apex court

The embattled former senator begged the Supreme Court in the two motions to stop the Attorney General of the Federation (AGF) and the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) from executing two Appeal Court judgments delivered against him in 2018 on extradition.

He said his appeals on the two judgments are pending in Supreme Court and will be rendered nugatory if extradited to America before hearing.

Meanwhile, the motions are expected to be heard along with the substantive appeal by the apex court.

Kashamu had filed two appeals before the apex court praying it to void the request of the American government that he be extradited to the USA to answer criminal charges against him in respect of an alleged heroine drug importation into the country.

The AGF and the NDLEA are the major respondents in the appeals in which the former senator is asking the Supreme Court is seeking relief.

He wants the apex court to review the two judgments delivered in favour of the Federal Government by the Lagos division of the Court of Appeal on May 4, 2018.

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Kashamu had in his notices of appeal to Supreme Court complained that the Court of Appeal erred in law by voiding and setting aside the two judgments of the Federal High court which barred Federal Government from extraditing him to America.

The ex-senator is praying the apex court to set aside the decisions of the Court of Appeal as they affected him.

But government through the AGF has responded with a counter prayer that the Supreme Court should uphold the judgments of the Court of Appeal which cleared the coast for his extradition.

The AGF claimed that the Appeal Court was right in setting aside the two judgments of the High Court because they were based on hearsay evidence of Kashamu before the court.

The AGF urged the Supreme Court to allow the judgments of the Court of Appeal to enable the Federal Government to extradite Kashamu to the USA to prove his innocence or otherwise in the hard drug trafficking criminal charge filed against him by the American government since 2015 when he was alleged to have escaped to Nigeria.

NIGERIAN TRIBUNE