Alleged Edo Judicial Fraud: How The Home Of U.S.-based Nigerian, Ekhator Was Demolished After Justice Erhabor’s Judgement

…Iyase of Benin calls home demolition an abomination in the land

…I see fraud in this matter, says Donald Inwalomhe, an Activist and security expert

After many years in the United States of America, where he went to school and contributed enormously to the country’s workforce, by at different times working for various employers, and later running his own healthcare business, Mr. Wilfred Ekhator felt it was time to move back to Nigeria.

First, he decided to build a massive housing property, meant to serve as both a residential and guest house on his large piece of land at a cost of about 500,000 thousand U.S. dollars. The edifice, a two-storey building was made up of three-bedroom boys’ quarters, 18 rooms, 10 living rooms, 18 bathrooms, large swimming pool, etc.

But in what looked like an irony of fate, the unthinkable happened when the completed building was leveled to the ground after his last trip to Nigeria 2017.

Upon hearing the devastating news, Ekhator collapsed, had multiple seizures and had to be rushed in an ambulance to Melrose Wakefield Hospital in Melrose, from where he was later transferred to Lahey Hospital in Burlington, both in Massachusetts where he spent one week.

His oldest brother in the family, who presided over the foundation laying ceremony of the building, Elder Robinson Ekhator also collapsed upon hearing the ugly news and was also taken in an ambulance to Boston Medical Center where he spent more than two weeks.

Wilfred’s immediate older brother, Harrison in Nigeria who also suffered from the shock, collapsed and was rushed to Ahgo Hospital in Benin City where he was treated.

Lost in the property, according to him are: 1000 fencing blocks, 2 big gates, 3 protector doors, 10 executive chairs, 4 mattresses, 3 plasma TV sets, 3 tables, 3 refrigerators, 4 air conditioners and 2 kitchen gas cylinders.

Others included, 20 curtains; 5 luggages of clothes, 6 fans, 30 electrical lights, 4 surveillance cameras (CCTV), 30 boxes of floor tiles, 2 sets of musical electronics, 6 doors and 2 chandelier lights.

For Ekhator, there is nothing more to live for after wasting his life savings on the projects. “I now have to take medications to sleep,” Ekhator sobbed.

“I better just die,” he told Alltimepost.com in Boston, Massachusetts during an interview to get his story to the world.

Alltimepost.com learnt that there was a dispute on the piece of land that housed his property, something Mr. Ekhator said he only knew when the building was still under construction. According to our findings, there were two conflicting judgments delivered on the dispute.

The conflicting judgements were delivered by Justice Efe Ikponwosa and Justice A.N. Erhabor. The first judgement which was in favor of Mr. Ekhator, was delivered by the former, saying the land belonged to him, while the second judgment, delivered by the later, awarded same land in the same High Court to one Elder (Barrister Edward Osifo) in a manner which analysts believe is suggestive of judicial fraud or a miscarriage of justice.

So, on a sunny, but quiet day in September, 2017 Elder Edward Osifo, a trained lawyer allegedly organized his agents/foot soldiers and took a bulldozer vehicle to House No 24, Felix Elema Street, Elema quarters and willfully pulled down the edifice.

The demolition of the massive structure, Ekhator said, not only sent shock waves to, but caused him and his family everlasting psychological and emotional injuries.

This is the sad story of former House No 24, Felix Elema Street on Elema layout, opposite Greater Tomorrow Secondary School, Government Reservation Area, (GRA) in Benin City.

It was situated on plot 48/49, measuring 228.083 and 1921. 9 square meters as shown on survey plan No 1274 of Elema Layout Scheme ll, Ward A, Oredo Local Government Area of Edo State, Nigeria.

From available documents, the demolished building in question legally belongs to Mr. Wilfred Ekhator, a bona fide Benin man based in the United States of America who now feels betrayed by the law of the land and questions his rationale for deciding to invest in and return to his native land in the first place.

Analysts believe this to be a perfect example of miscarriage of justice, as the second judgment was reportedly rendered in a hurry to Barrister (Elder) Edward Osifo, who used the available loopholes within the letters of the law to the tilt to cleverly claim a piece of land that had been legally determined not to belong to him by the very instruments of the law, way back in November 2011. The story goes like this:

In 1988, Elder Osifo bought part of the Elema family land from one Giwa Amu. The Elemas (Prince Friday Elema and Sunday Elema, the administrators of the Estate of their late father, Felix Owen Elema of Evboema) took Barrister Osifo to court over the said land. Osifo later filed a counter claim that the land duly belonged to him.

Judgment was however given on November 3rd, 2011, in High Court 8, Benin City by Judge Efe Ikponwosa. The Court granted Osifo only one relief i.e. a portion of the land – 280.3.4.5 square meters in Ward A Elema Layout, GRA.

But, the Court in its wisdom refused to grant him the 2nd relief i.e. (228.083, 1921.98, plot 48/49) that Mr. Wilfred E. Ekhator had bought from the Elemas too; that he (Osifo) could not prove his case that Ekhator was a trespasser.

Excerpts from the historic judgment, delivered by Judge Efe Ikponwosa shows the fact as follows: “On the sale to one Mr. Ekhator, all the 1st defendant did was to refer the sale.

“The burden of proof in a civil suit lies on the person who would fail if no evidence is given regarding this trespass to enable Court make any pronouncement on it…I dismiss the other claims against the plaintiff as the 1st defendant has failed to prove them on the balance of probabilities.’’

Not satisfied that he could not claim the whole plot of the land in dispute by himself alone, Barrister Osifo filed an Appeal in November 2011, only for him to abandon it and quickly ran to another Court – High Court 10.

In the suit No B/245/08/12, Elder Osifo (plaintiff) versus unknown builders (defendants), he (Osifo) added both the 1st and 2nd relief of the former case of 2011 together and asked the Court to assist him to execute the land (33115.147 meters) in his writ of summons.

In what looked like a clever manipulation of the court system, Elder Osifo knowing absolutely that Wilfred Ekhator was not based in Nigeria succeeded in convincing the Court that: ‘’all processes in this fact are duly served and not controverter and are deemed to have been received and admitted more so as there is no defense to the summons.’’

Yes, “No defense to the summons,” because according to Mr. Wilfred Ekhator, the so called (unknown builder), he never knew about the case in Court 10, under Hon. Justice A.N. Erhabor. Osifo claimed that the first suit in 2011 was ‘dismissed in its entirety’ but according to Justice Erhabor:

Osifo “failed to show that the area referred to in the aforesaid judgment is the same area or location referred to as 24 Felix Elema… Nothing in the body of the affidavit links the area referred to in the judgment with the above address.’’

Regrettably, Justice Erhabor saw the fact, but ignored it and went ahead to grant Elder Osifo the ownership of the property at No 24, Felix Elema, hook, line and sinker, in his judgment of November 5th, 2012.

All this while, Mr. Ekhator said he was not aware until the building was completed and Osifo allegedly began to harass him with the use of police to vacate the building, up to when he went to Nigeria in 2017.

The Police Connection

Wilfred Ekhator, President and owner of a healthcare company, known as Community Health Care Incorporated in Boston, Massachusetts has accused the Nigeria Police in Edo of complicity with Osifo to chase him out of his home.

According to him, the police broke into the property and asked him to leave, accusing him of trespassing or be arrested. That was when he moved out of the house.

He told Alltimepost.com that his electrician and a relative were eventually arrested by the police and he had to pay 60,000 each to bail them, besides other forms of extortions to which he was subjected by some men of the nation’s security force.

He wondered why some members of the security agency allowed themselves to be used in the land matter to intimidate him and called on the Nigeria Government to curb the excesses of the police force and the endemic corruption in the system.

According to him, such a traumatic treatment meted out to him does not fit the profile of a government calling on its citizens in the Diaspora to come back home and invest in the development of the country.

Alltimepost.com was told that a notice of Appeal has been filed at Court 10, on behalf of Wilfred Ekhator by his lawyer, who declined to be named in this report. The Appeal is seeking an order of the honorable court that the 1st defendant (EKHATOR) is the one entitled to the Certificate of Occupancy (C of O); that the plaintiffs (Osifo etc.) are trespassers.

Analysts see the whole incident as a sad irony as the Ekhator’s property that would have added value, beauty, color etc., to the Elema Layout in GRA, has been demolished.

Demolition of property, according to our findings must be supported by a court order, properly served to all parties involved, with police accompaniment. However, Alltimepost.com could not ascertain if Osifo obtained an order to that effect.

In the ancient Kingdom of Benin, demolition is regarded as an abomination. Alltimepost.com spoke to an array of experts, the police and opinion leaders, including the Iyase of Benin on the issue of demolition.

First, the Iyase (Prime Minister) of the Great Benin Kingdom, Chief Sam Igbe, a retired police officer and serial author was brutally frank when he noted thus: ‘’Building demolition is not in our culture, we Binis, Edos abhor it.

“It is an abomination, it is not allowed, it is wrong. The point I am making here is that demolition of building is unacceptable in our land. You cannot comprehend it. Anyone that has done that under any guise, not to talk of a disputed land must be punished and condemned in the strongest terms possible.

“It is sacrilegious. Willful demolition of blocks or fence of a building is not even allowed, not to talk of bringing down an entire edifice. It is totally wrong.’’

Comrade Leo Atakpu, Deputy Executive Director of Africa Network for Environment and Economic Justice (ANEEJ), in his own submission said: “It is wrong if you view it from both the cultural and legal grounds.

In a case of a disputed land it is wrong…It should not have happened. The party that went to demolish ought to have waited, so long as all the available windows within the judiciary have not been exhausted as a way of final judgment.’’

Tony Abolo, Convener, Development Agenda of the Niger Delta (DAND), a seasoned broadcaster, elder statesman, gave a sociological and psychological interpretation to the issue.

According to the erudite scholar: ‘’There are the Benin factor, economic factor and the new social factor. First, the Benin factor, land is crucial to anybody in Benin. When it concerns land it is agitated like how the Massai in East Africa and the Fulanis in the Northeastern part of Nigeria cherish cattle, because it is a measure of wealth.

“That is how the Binis cherish land and landed property. And so when a man went that far, it is his emotional self that is being unleashed. That can account for that kind of behavior of demolishing a building just like that, that look natural and seems outside the law.

From the economic angle, he noted that research has shown that poor governance has hardly left anything for the Binis to convert to cash, other than land “and hence you find the same piece of land is sold to seven different persons without any conscience at all; people are duped ignorantly and regrettably many people will still act in the same manner the party that demolished the building in contention.”

At the social behavior level, he said materialism was the thing that drives the behavior of the elite; “it is the question of greed, greed is driving the process. You wonder why the legal option that should have solved the matter is never allowed to solve the matter in dispute…Still of real concern is the fact that the potent traditional Court of Appeal, i.e. the Oba Palace is being narrowed and made frustrating for some people who want justice genuinely by some selfish parochial characters close to the traditional system.

“A review of the communal land holding system and the Land Use Act to create fairness and accountability is long overdue in this regard. In the end there is nothing like an expanded economy system which will satisfy competition and alleviate poverty.’’

An anonymous legal practitioner posited as follows: “A supposedly trained lawyer as far as I am concerned cannot go to the extent of demolishing a building in contention without getting a writ of execution from the court, because there are processes involved before a building can be demolished, like bringing in policemen that will supervise the process etc.

“If the party that demolished that building did it without stipulated statutory approval then something must have been very wrong with such individuals, or somewhere. I want to believe nobody is above the law?’’

Donald Inwalomhe, a security expert and Executive Director of a Benin City-based Justice Research Centre, was absolutely concerned about the credibility and integrity of the High Court in Benin City, Edo State in this tending issue when he opined that: ’’Binocular lenses must be directed at the judges that have handled this matter from the initial stage.

“What was the problem with the judgment given by Judge Efe Ikponwosa in 2011? Why did Justice Erhabor rush to deliver judgment in favor of Barrister Osifo in 2012 given the contentious nature of the matter, where there was no defense to the summons originated from Osifo?

“I think at the end of the day if justice is not seen to be served transparently and laced with equity and fairness, the aggrieved party should approach the National Judicial Council for redress ultimately.

“This is a perfect case of conflicting judgments from two judges within the same High Court in Edo State within twelve calendar months in 2011 and 2012. I see fraud in this matter’’

The angle of the National Judicial Council (NJC) will definitely be interesting and captivating, given the nature of this case, even as we await anxiously the final outcome of the Appeal that has been dully served at High Court 10, he said.

“The attention of the revered Benin Monarch, Oba Ewuare ll (Ogidigan) is hereby drawn to this matter, to find a way of inviting both parties, since they are his subjects to articulate a win-win strategy to it.

“Finally, every single effort must be made to encourage the Binis in diaspora to be passionate about coming home to contribute to the even development of the social and economic architecture of Benin Kingdom nay Edo State of Nigeria.”

“A diasporan like Mr. Wilfred Ekhator must never be made to regret or suffer for too long about his genuine decision to help develop his home town, he cautioned.

Efforts to obtain comments from the Commissioner for Physical Planning and Urban Development, Edo State Hon. Edorodion Oye Erimona to speak on the trend were unsuccessful as he was said to be away the number of times our reporter’s visited his office at BDPA building, Sokponba road, Benin City.

A note left with his Personal Assistant/Secretary and massages sent to his phone number and email account were never responded to by the honorable Commissioner.

All spirited efforts made to obtain the view of Barrister Paul Nosayaba Ohonbamu, the Edo State Commissioner for Communication, proved abortive, as several calls made to his cell phone were not answered.

A visit to the Edo State Ministry of Communication complex along Ezoti Street, Benin City did not yield any fruit either, as the Commissioner was said to be attending a meeting.

In trying to reach the Elemas (original owners of the land that sold to Mr. Ekhator), a guide close to them said they were not in the mood to speak to anybody concerning the inheritance of their late father.

All efforts to seek the opinion of Elder Edward Osifo were unsuccessful.

However, the Spokesman for the Edo State Police Command in Benin City, DSP Chidi Nwabuzor stated, when contacted, that it is a criminal offence for anyone or group to engage in demolition of building without following legal procedures.

DSP Nwabuzor explained that only a competent court has the powers to order the removal of a structure or building erected in another person’s land.

He further said that when judgement is delivered in favor of a particular litigant against another, there are also legal processes to be met before such demolition or removal order could be executed.

Though the police Public Relations Officer said he was unaware of the case in reference, he advised property owners to always approach the court whenever there is a trespass on their property to avoid a case of the hunter becoming the hunted.