Court acquits Mbadinuju over murder of Igwe couple

11.03.2008

A High Court in Onitsha, Anambra State, has dismissed murder charges against a former governor of the state, Dr. Chinwoke Mbadinuju, because of a lack of evidence to prove that he hired hitmen to kill an opponent, court papers showed on Monday.

Mbadinuju was charged with the 2002 murder of prominent lawyer, Barnabas Igwe and his wife, Abigail. Igwe was a critic of Mbadinuju's government.

Mbadinuju, who was governor from 1999 to 2003, had pleaded not guilty to ordering the murder of the couple when he was first charged in December 2005.

"On the face of the police investigation report ... the applicant has no case to answer for murder," Justice D.O.C. Amaechina said in the ruling.

The Igwes were dragged from their car and shot as they returned from a party in Onitsha, the commercial capital of Anambra. The killers then hacked off the woman's leg and ran over the bodies with a car.

Igwe was chairman of the Onitsha branch of the Nigerian Bar Association, which immediately accused agents of the state government of the murders. Igwe had backed civil servants in a dispute with the governor over unpaid wages.

At the time, the Onitsha bar association threatened to boycott courts in the state and called on then President Olusegun Obasanjo to declare a state of emergency in Anambra.

As governor, Mbadinuju enjoyed immunity from prosecution, but he lost his seat at a 2003 election.