Oyinlola asks AGF to prosecute mtn directors

Former Governor of Osun State and erstwhile Peoples Democratic Party National Secretary, Prince Olagunsoye Oyinlola, has written to the Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Mohammed Bello Adoke, SAN, asking that members of the Board of MTN Nigeria Communications Limited be prosecuted as recommended by the police.

In his letter dated 21 March, 2013, titled, RE: POLICE INVESTIGATION REPORT ON A CASE OF CONSPIRACY, FORGERY AND PERVERSION OF THE COURSE OF JUSTICE BY MTN NIGERIA LTD, Oyinlola posited: 'A company's 'directing mind and will' are members of its Board of Directors, who exercise control and management over the organization, and on whom the law imposes strict duties in the exercise of those functions.

'That being the case, the acts of the 'directing mind and will' or the 'alter ego' of a company are to be directly attributed to the company'.

Oyinlola, himself a lawyer, stated further: 'Conversely, if the police have recommended that MTN be prosecuted for a crime, my humble view is that to give effect to that recommendation, it is members of the Board of MTN that should face prosecution'.

Additionally, the former governor  wants the suspended President of the Court of Appeal, Justice Isa Ayo Salami, prosecuted for alleged manipulation of call data records (including Salami's) that MTN forwarded to the security agencies at the behest of the National Judicial Council's Special Investigative Panel which heard Oyinlola's petition in 2011 arising from his protest on his loss of the case on the Osun State guberatorial election.

The perjury case against Rotimi Odusola, Senior Manager, Commercial Legal with MTN, according to the ex-governor, is a separate and distinct matter altogether', he concluded.

In a related development, he also forwarded a petition, titled: JUSTICE AYO SALAMI AND MTN: ADDITIONAL PROOF OF CONSPIRACY TO TAMPER WITH EVIDENCE, to the Chief Justice of Nigeria and Chairman, National Judicial Council, Aloma Mariam Mukhtar.

In the letter, which was acknowledged as received on 20 March, 2013 and to which he attached NJC's letter of invitation to MTN, Oyinlola said, 'Further to my letter of the 14th of February, I wish to avail Council, through your office, of additional proof of conspiracy to tamper with evidence, involving Justice Ayo Salami and MTN Nigeria Communications.

'Paragraph 2 of the attached National Judicial Council's letter of invitation to MTN clearly states that the request to appear as witness before the Special Investigative Panel, which heard my petition, was at Justice Ayo Salami's instance.

'Additionally, aside the fact that the Chairman of the National Judicial Council's Special Investigative Panel, retired Justice Umar Abdullahi, announced during one of the Panel's sittings that Justice Salami was inviting the telecoms service provider to appear as his witness (the record of proceedings should reveal this), MTN's representative, one Rotimi Odusola, was led in evidence by one of the suspended PCA's coterie of lawyers, Lateef Fagbemi.

'As a minister in the temple of justice myself, I would be elated, if the hunch I have, that Justice Ayo Salami and MTN constituted themselves into a cog in the wheel of justice, proves to be contrary'.