A High Court in Ikot Ekpene, Akwa Ibom State sentences a lecturer, who laments miserable salary to death for armed robbery, while another get jail term for extortion
By Chinedu Oguh, Port Harcourt
The High Court of Akwa Ibom State, sitting in Ikot Ekpene, has sentenced a cultist, Innocent Ntokon and a lecturer at Akwa Ibom State Polytechnic, Abel Udo Jacob, to various prison terms for their roles in financial extortion amounting to over ₦50 million.
The trial judge, Justice Augustine Odokwo found the accused guilty of subjecting a local businessman Edikan Jacob Jackson, to a “merciless extortion scheme” leading to loss of over ₦50 million and the near-collapse of his legacy family business.
The prosecution proved that between 2016 and 2020, Innocent Ntokon used his position as a leader in Klans Confraternity to terrorize the victim. The court heard harrowing testimony of how Ntokon sent “armed enforcers” to victim’s shops and used death threats against the victim’s mother and sisters to compel monthly payments.
The convicted lecturer, who holds a PhD in Engineering and currently teaches at Akwa Ibom Polytechnic, acted as the “financial clearinghouse” for the syndicate.
The court rejected his defence that he believed the millions passing through his account were for NDDC roofing contracts, describing the claim as “totally not in accord with common sense”. At the end of the two-hour judgement, the defendants pleaded for mercy.
The court, in considering their plea for mercy, noted, “the victim was psychologically terrorized for four years and lost his father partly due to a lack of funds caused by this very extortion” emphasizing that the court must weigh the gravity of the psychological trauma inflicted on the victims.
Justice Odokwo, while evaluating the evidence described Ntokon as a “predator who used the cloak of a trader to hide the heart of a hardened and merciless cultist and extortionist”.
Innocent Ntokon was convicted for 8 years on counts of demanding with menace, stealing, terrorism and cultism, while the lecturer bagged a maximum sentence of three years for demanding with menace, stealing and terrorism.
In a move to ensure “crime does not pay”, the court ordered the convicts to jointly and severally pay ₦25,000,000 to the victim. The court also ordered that a Toyota Avensis and a Mercedes Benz, identified as proceeds of the crime, be forfeited to the state and be auctioned to provide partial restitution to the complainant.
In the same vein, an Ondo State high court sitting in Akure has sentenced a lecturer at the College of Health Technology, Ijero-Ekiti in Ekiti State, Shehu Isiaka, to death by hanging after finding him guilty of armed robbery and conspiring to commit armed robbery.
Justice O. M. Adejumo delivered the judgment after ruling that the prosecution successfully proved two of the three charges filed against the defendant. The court however, discharge and acquitted Isiaka on the third count bordering on endangering life or health, stating that the allegation was not proven beyond reasonable doubt.
Isiaka was first arraigned on November 26, 2018 on a three-count charge of conspiracy to commit armed robbery and endangering life.
According to the prosecution, the incident occurred on July 5, 2017, around 11 am when the defendant and accomplices who are still at large allegedly robbed a commercial driver, Olatunji Olowoyeye of his Nissan Cabstar vehicle with registration number XJ 214 KPU at a gunpoint along the Ibuji axis of the Akure-Ilesha Expressway.
While testifying in court Olowoyeye said he knew the defendant prior to the incident. He explained that Isiaka and two other men hired him in Ilesa to transport cocoa beans from Igbara-Oke for ₦20,000, paying ₦8,000 upfront with a promise to settle the balance after the trip.
The driver told the court, the situation turned dangerous when the men asked him to reverse his vehicle into a bush near a primary school at Ibuji. According to him, one of the suspects suddenly produced a gun while Isiaka sat beside him in front seat.
He alleged that the suspects dragged him out of the vehicle, collected his phone, money and vehicle key, tied his hands and legs and abandoned him in the bush.
The victim further claimed that the defendant injected him with a substance before tying him to a tree. He said he later managed to roll through the bush until he reached the highway, where police officers rescued him and took him to a hospital.
Olowoyeye told the court he passed bloody urine for several days and spent about 15 days in the hospital receiving treatment.
A police witness, Inspector Kehinde Omotosho also testified that highway patrol officers brought the victim to Igbara-Oke Police Station naked, after which he made a statement identifying Isiaka as one of the attackers.
During the trial the defendant denied all allegations. He insisted he had no involvement in the robbery and also rejected claims that he injected the victim, arguing that he was not a medical practitioner and had no access to syringes or injection materials.
Isiaka further told the court that investigators failed to present any syringe or medical report to support the claim that the victim had been injected with a poisonous substance.
In delivering judgment, Justice Adejumo held that the prosecution failed to establish the charge of endangering life as required under section 135(1) of the Evidence Act.
The judge noted that there was no eyewitness account of the alleged injection and no medical report to substantiate the victim’s claim of being injected or hospitalised due to the act. He added that it would be unsafe to rely solely on oral testimony without supporting medical evidence.
Consequently the court resolved the doubts in favour of the defendant and acquitted him on that count.
However, the court found that the prosecution presented sufficient evidence linking Isiaka to the armed robbery and conspiracy.
Justice Adejumo, therefore, convicted the lecturer and sentenced him to life imprisonment for conspiracy and death by hanging for armed robbery.
Pronouncing the sentence, the judge declared that the convict should “be hanged by the neck until he is dead,” while praying that God would have mercy on his soul. The prosecution was led by John Dada Joshua, while O. I. Tiwo represented the defendant.
Meanwhile, a lecturer of the University of Port Harcourt (UNIPORT) from the Department of English, Dr. Nazi Eze has cried out online after his request to get a loan was rejected by the bank manager because of his salary. He also spoke about the pay of professors while explaining that he might reach that peak in a few years’ time.
“I am a lecturer, Department of English, I went to obtain a loan and the bank manager told me that she cannot grant the loan because my salary is a miserable ₦191,000,” further explaining that his request to get a loan from the bank was turned down because his salary was miserable.
“And in the next 6-8 years, I will be a professor and my salary will not be up to ₦500,000” He claimed that several other lecturers in many other universities get similar pay.
A Nigerian academic who previously worked as a lecturer abroad has shared details about his monthly earnings while reflecting on his experience teaching outside the country.
The man, identified as Dozie Francis Okpaleke made the disclosure in a post on his social media page while advising Nigerians on ways to improve their lives and career opportunities.
According to him, if he had remained in Nigeria as an associate professor or senior lecturer, his salary would not exceed a certain amount. He argued that many lecturers in Nigerian Universities currently earn less than $500 monthly.
“I know for a fact that if I were in Nigeria today, my salary as a Senior lecturer/ Associate Professor would not be up to ₦500,000 naira. That is less than £250 or less than $400. If I hadn’t ‘Japa’ years ago, it would pain me to know that I could earn better for the same position and have access to several research and travel grants that could earn me more than $7,000/month. It would hurt me to know that my monthly salary could not even buy a flight ticket to the USA, UK, or Canada, let alone Australia or New Zealand.
No professor in Nigeria University earns $500/monthly. When I was lecturing abroad my take home monthly take home pay was $2,000, an equivalent of ₦2.7 million.
A former lecturer at Covenant University also displays his salary and explained that when he started as an assistant lecturer, his take-home salary was less than ₦100,000, but it increased after he earned his PhD and gained years of experience.
