The legal battle between Alhaji Mustapha Muhammad Inuwa, the Secretary to the Government of Katsina State (SGS) and a Kaduna based blogger, Mahdi Shehu continued before a Katsina State High Court.
The court at its last sitting presided over by Justice Hajaratu Hajo Lawal granted an application filed by the appellant counsel to transmit records of the lower court proceedings as evidence in a trial between his client and the respondent.
The ruling was given during an appeal session filed by Mahdi Shehu through his counsel, Barrister Abbas Machika.
Delivering her ruling, Justice Hajaratu Hajo Lawal said the documents to be tendered by the counsel to the respondent are vital in the trial, hence the need for its admission to serve as another evidence.
She added that the counsel to the appellant failed to prove that the documents to be transmitted from the lower court are incompetent before the court.
The Judge cited relevant cases from the Nigeria Weekly Law report to support the ruling on the need for the court to accept the records of the lower court proceedings as another evidence in the trial.
She, therefore, ruled that the documents to be tendered by the counsel to the respondent are certified copies of the lower court proceedings which are vital in the trial.
Justice Hajaratu however rejected one copy of the document that was said to be from a lower court along Daura road in Katsina.
The Judge who accepted the remaining documents as properly filed and transmitted, granted ninety days within which the appellant can appeal the ruling.
She later adjourned the case to the next appeal session date that would be communicated for the continuation of the trial, precisely after the court vacation.
It would be recalled that Alhaji Mustapha Muhammad Inuwa sued Mahdi Shehu before a Katsina state upper Shari’ah Court (2) on alleged assault and defamation of character
