The Chief Judge (CJ) of Kaduna State, Justice Muhammad Tukur Aliyu, has declined to transfer the criminal case against former governor, Mallam Nasir el-Rufai to another judge for fresh trial.
The Chief predicated his refusal on the grounds that there is no basis to take away the case file from Justice Darius Hyet Khobo of the Kaduna State High Court, before whom the former governor is standing trial.
Justice Aliyu, in an internal letter dated August 19 and sighted by Thisday, subsequently ordered the trial judge to proceed with the trial and determine it in line with the law and with fairness.
el-Rufai is standing trial on a nine-count amended charge dated 10 April 2026, bordering on alleged advance-fee-fraud and corrupt-practices offences.
Although he pleaded not guilty but has remain in custody of the Independent Corrupt Practices and other related offences Commission (ICPC), since his arrest and the subsequent refusal of his bail applications, by Justice Khobo.
The refusal of Justice Khobo to grant him bail, pending the determination of the case, however prompted his petitions to the CJ, citing alleged bias and predetermination to convict the defendant.
While the first petition was written on June 30, by el-Rufai’s team of lawyers led by Ubong Akpan, the former governor and a chieftain of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), personally wrote the second dated July 6.
However, after due consideration of the petitions the CJ stated that he found no reason to invoke his administration powers to transfer the case to another judge.
“I have studied and considered the petitions dated June 30, 2026 and July 6, 2026, respectively submitted by Counsel for the Defendant and the Defendant, as well as Your Lordship’s responses to the said petitions dated July 16, 2026.
“Pursuant to the powers conferred on me under Section 111(1}+{4) of the Kaduna State Administration of Criminal Justice Law, 2017, a body of three (3) reputable legal! practitioners was constituted to investigate the petitions and submit its report. The committee submitted its report yesterday, August 18, 2026.
“The Committee found no basis for the exercise of my administrative powers to transfer the matter from Your Lordship to another Judge of the High Court of Justice, Kaduna State.
“Accordingly, Your Lordship shall proceed with the hearing and determination of the matter in accordance with the law and fairness”, the letter addressed to Justice Khobo read in part.
The former had on July 6, personally wrote the CJ requesting the transfer of charge NO. KDOH/KAD/ICPC/01/2026 — Federal Republic of Nigeria v. Mallam Nasir el-Rufai – from Justice Darius Hyet Khobo to any other Judge of the High Court of Justice, Kaduna State.
“I, Nasir Ahmad E!-Rufai, write this letter personally and in my own hand, on my own instruction and without the interposition of any intermediary, to bring to Your Lordship’s attention matters of the gravest constitutional and institutional magnitude concerning the conduct of Hon. Justice Darius Hyet Khobo in the charge pending against me before this Honourable Court.
“I write with the full knowledge that this letter may form part of the record in proceedings before this Court, before the Court of Appeal, and before the National Judicial Council, as circumstances may dictate, and I write accordingly with all sense of responsibility. Your Lordship will forgive the directness of my language.
“I have spent nearly three decades of my lifetime in public service. I care deeply about institutional integrity not only in Kaduna State but our nation at large.
“I therefore know the difference between a judge who applies the law and a judge who has already decided the case”, el-Rufai stated.
He claimed among others that Justice Khobo has already convicted him on the face of his ruling, when the judge held that el-Rufai’s “conduct during the failed attempt by the SSS to unlawfully arrest me and seize my passport, upon my voluntary return to Nigeria to respond to an EFFC invitation discloses not assertion of rights and resisting illegality but “a clear pattern of disregard for the rule of law”.
“My Lord Chief Judge, this is not a bail-stage assessment of flight risk. This is a Character conviction. It brands me a lawbreaker before any evidence has been led, before any witness has testified, before the Prosecution has proved a single element of the nine-count charge beyond reasonable doubt. It is a finding on my character and criminal propensity that Section 36(5) of the Constitution reserves exclusively for the trial itself.
“Second, the learned trial Judge recorded, as established fact rather than as an untested allegation, that I made “un-retracted death threats against prosecutors and witnesses or anyone who tries to criminalize the Applicant”.
“The learned trial Judge was here referring to a video clip on YouTube where I asserted my right to innocence and to confront any one that attempts to destroy my name and hard-earned reputation. I neither threatened anyone with death nor mentioned witnesses or prosecutors in the political statement. I doubt very much if the learned trial Judge had bothered to review the video clip in full at all”.
Besides, the defendant told the CJ that the manner with which Justice Khobo conducts his trial suggest a “mob mentality and pressure mounted on him by some disgruntled Southern Kaduna leaders since this case was assigned to him”.
el-Rufai stated further, “Your Lordship, I am presently in ICPC custody. I have been in detention for 140 days today. My health is deteriorating. I am a 66-year-old man with a serious, life-threatening prostate-related ailment, as established by the medical evidence before this Court. Every day of delay risks irreparable prejudice to my liberty, my health, and my fundamental rights.
“The learned trial Judge has, in my presence in Court, refused to accept the citation of decisive authorities that contradicted his predetermined position. This is not a difference of judicial interpretation. It is the misuse of binding authority to reach a predetermined result, and clear expression of bias, at best or deep-seated hatred, at worst.
“The Ruling is, on its own face, internally self-contradictory”.
The defendant pointed out that he does not seek to evade trial but, is prepared to face the charge before any other judge of this Honourable Court, that would not be subject to such and similar pressures of an alleged vengeful cabal.
“I seek only what the Constitution guarantees: a fair hearing before an impartial tribunal. It is clear from the foregoing that I cannot obtain that before Hon. Justice Darius Hyet Khobo. He has already convicted me in his mind as revealed by his Ruling. He has promised my conviction to my political adversaries”, he stated.
Among the reliefs sought included the assignment and re-assignment of causes in the High Court of Kaduna State:
(a) To examine the enclosed Ruling of 10 June 2026 and this letter, the matters complained of being apparent on their face and supported by the additional details that I am prepared to produce;
(b) To transfer Charge No. KDH/KAD/ICPC/01/2026 from the docket of Hon. Justice Darius Hyet Khobo and re-assign it to any other judge of the High Court of Justice, Kaduna State, before whom the substantive trial may proceed;
(c) To direct that my pending applications in the matter — inciuding the disclosure and strike-out motions heid over pending the bail ruling — be heard de novo by the judge to whom the matter is re-assigned; and
(d) For the avoidance of doubt, I do not by this letter seek bail, nor any review of the merits of the bail ruling, nor any interference with the appeal pending before the Court of Appeal, the determination of which is reserved to that Court.
I respectfully submit that the relief sought is administrative in character, lies squarely within Your Lordship’s authority over the docket of the Court, and is the proportionate and least disruptive means of securing me a trial that is, and is seen to be, fair.
In the first petition filed by Akpan, The defendant claimed that the ruling discloses conduct that no system of justice can tolerate in the Judge who is to try the substantive charge.
“We set out the gravest matters first. Under Head A, we show that the learned trial Judge has already pronounced the Defendant guilty in the language of his Ruling; under Head B, that he has turned the binding decisions of the Supreme Court on their head to reach the result he wanted; and under Head C, that he detained a presumptively innocent citizen on findings that exist nowhere in the evidence before him.
“Taken together — and each would suffice alone — they establish that the Defendant cannot receive a fair trial at his hands.
Recall that Justice Khobo had refused the different bail applications by el-Rufai on the grounds that he “has failed to disclose any special circumstances or changed facts to distinguish this application from the one refused on April 21, 2026”.
Besides, the judge had held that”the gravity of the charges, the unretracted death threats against prosecutors and witnesses or anyone who tries to criminalize the Applicant and the potential for interference with ongoing investigations regards those at large, make the continued detention of the Applicant a necessity for the protection of the judicial process.
“Accordingly, above lone issue formulated for the determination of this application is resolved against the Defendant and in favour of the Respondent. Thus, the Defendant/ Applicant’s second motion for bail pending trial is refused”.