In its earlier judgment, the court held that a certain James Onanefe Ibori was, indeed, convicted in the certified true copy of the Bwari Upper Area Court and ordered a de novo trial by an Abuja High Court to unveil the identity of the said convict.

At the trial, presided over byJustice Husseini Mukhtar of the Abuja High Court, the judge, after considering the submissions of counsel for the parties in the suit, came to a conclusion that there was no sufficient evidence before him linking the Delta State governor to the same James Ibori that was convicted in 1995 by the Bwari Upper Area Court.

Justice Husseini also held that the evidence adduced by the star prosecution witness, Anwal Yusuf, who was the judge of the Bwari Upper Area Court, were “contradictory and not credible enough to be relied upon” in coming to a conclusion that it was Governor Ibori that was convicted by him in 1995.

Not satisfied with the decision of the trial court, the plaintiffs, two chieftains of the Peoples Democratic Party [PDP], Messrs Goodnews Agbi and Anthony Alabi, through their counsel, Chief Gani Fawehinmi [SAN] appealed against the judgment at the Court of Appeal. In its judgment, the appellate court upheld the decision of the trial court while hammering on the inconsistencies and contradictions in the evidence of PWI as the basis of its judgment.

It was at this stage that the matter found its way back to the supreme court where the appellants are asking the apex court to overrule the decisions of the lower courts on the ground that the two courts derailed on the issues before them in reaching their decisions.