NJC probe: My line was hacked to call ACN chieftains -Salami

A dramatic dimension was on Wednesday introduced into the ongoing National Judicial Council’s probe of the alleged rot in the judiciary when the President of the Court of Appeal, Justice Ayo Salami,

reportedly opened his defence by claiming that his mobile telephone line was ‘spoofed’ to speak with chieftains of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN) before, during and after the governorship appeal judgments in Ekiti and Osun states.

To drive home his claim, he was said to have brought a witness, Mr Sheriff Usman, to demonstrate to the five-man panel headed by Justice Umaru Abdullahi how the deed was allegedly done.

Nigerian Tribune had exclusively reported that Salami would be producing his star witness at yesterday’s proceedings.

Usman is the Head of Information Communication Technology (ICT), at the Court of Appeal, Abuja.

He works directly with the office of the President of the Court.

A source who was privy to Wednesday’s sitting disclosed that Usman also demonstrated spoofing on a laptop, succeeding with the mobile telephone line of a counsel for Salami, but failed to perform the same feat with that of the counsel for Osun and Ekiti PDP, Mr Lekan Olatawura.

Known as ‘hacking’ in local parlance, spoofing, a register in the IT circles, is defined by Wikipedia, a free web-based collaborative multilingual encyclopedia, as the practice of causing a telephone network to display a number on the recipient’s phone which is not that of the actual caller.

Salami had earlier stated in his written defence that the call logs were not genuine, until the National Security Adviser (NSA), General Owoye Azazi declared them genuine.

Former Governors Olagunsoye Oyinlola of Osun State and Segun Oni of Ekiti State had accused Salami of engaging in an alleged unholy communication with ACN chieftains during the hearing of the governorship appeals in the states.

Salami, by his defence, on Wednesday, had finally agreed that the communication took place but his mobile line was illegally used by persons he did not identify in his defence yesterday.

Also, the ACN gubernatorial candidate in Kebbi State, Turaki Kabiru Tanimu, testified before the panel and was said to have admitted sending text messages to Justice Salami, which he reportedly called “Friday greeting text.”

He also reportedly told the panel that he normally sends text to his friends on Friday.

The Osun State chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) had accused Justice Salami of exchanging text messages with the ACN candidate in Kebbi State by 4.00 a.m. on November 26, 2010, when the Appeal Court was scheduled to deliver judgment that day.

Led in evidence by Niyi Akintola, the witness reportedly told the panel that the call logs tendered by both the NSA and the PDP were not authentic.

Answering questions from the PDP counsel, Usman was said to have admitted that MTN did not tell him that the call logs were not authentic.

The witness was also reportedly made to read an exhibit a copy of The Nation earlier tendered by Justice Salami in which MTN was quoted as asserting that it was not possible to hack into its system.

He was also said to have told the panel that he was not aware that Justice Salami did not deny the authenticity of the call logs in his written reply to the two petitions.

While the PDP, at the end of the cross examination, was said to have indicated its readiness to adopt its final address, the chairman of the panel, Justice Umaru Abdullahi, reportedly informed the petitioner that Justice Salami, on Tuesday, brought a letter to the panel, informing it of its intention to call a director of MTN to testify for him.

The panel was said to have subsequently adjourned the matter till June 9, for the MTN director to appear before for it.