BREAKING: 2 lawyers withdraw from Gov. Yusuf’s thieving aide case against Jaafar Jaafar, say their names fraudulently included by Barrister Dantani

Two legal practitioners, Ahmed Musa and Ridwan Yunusa have distanced themselves from a purported petition written to the Chief Registrar of Kano State High Court to prosecute the publisher of DAILY NIGERIAN newspaper, Jaafar Jaafar, and his colleague, Umar Audu, following a corruption report against the Director General of Protocol, Kano State Government House, Abdullahi Rogo.

In a crass display of professional misconduct, the names of the two lawyers were fraudulently included by Gov. Yusuf’s fairweather lawyer, Hamza Dantani.

Mr Dantani, who styles himself as rights activist, was engaged by the governor to file trumped up defamation charges against the journalists in order to stifle the freedom of the press.

Recall that DAILY NIGERIAN had exclusively reported how ICPC and EFCC indicted Mr Rogo of looting N6.5 billion.

The funds, said to be for contracts that were neither awarded nor executed, were moved from the Kano State Government Federation Allocation Accounts to accounts of Bureau De Change operators in Abuja.

Angered by the report,  Mr Rogo filed a direct complaint to the Chief Registrar of Kano State High Court for describing him as “thieving aide”.

In the petition signed by Mr Rogo’s counsel, Hamza Nuhu Dantani Potent Attorneys, and dated August 27, the governor’s aide claimed the report was defamatory and capable of causing public disturbance and breach of peace.

Others listed as complainant counsel to the petitioner are, Mubarak Abubakar, Esq; Saadatu A. Mohammed Esq; Ramla Abdulkadir Sani, Esq; Ahmed Musa, Esq and; Ridwan Yunusa, Esq.

But Messrs Musa and Yunusa distanced themselves from the petition.

In a statement on Sunday, Mr Yunusa said he didn’t authorise the use of his name on petition, adding he has never been a part of the law firms that signed it.

“The attention of the general public is hereby drawn to the fact that I have withdrawn my name from a case associated with the embattled Director of Protocol, Kano State, in the criminal complaint against a public interest journalist, Mr. Jaafar Jaafar.

“I wish to make it abundantly clear that I have not authorised the use of my name in respect of this matter ab initio.

“I was at no point part of the law office of Potent Attorneys and thus, my name was unauthorisedly used,” he said.

Also speaking to our correspondent, Mr Musa said, “Ridwan drew my attention to the petition. And I said I wasn’t aware of it.

“He then said he will be issuing a disclaimer and I requested him to forward the petition to me. And when he did, I saw my name as one of those who signed it. Although I knew those who signed it, but my name was included without my consent,” he said.