Adamawa state Governor, Mohammed Jibrilla Bindow, is locked in bitter dispute with some family members on his claim of right over the N34billion worth of assets in Abuja, believed to belong to his late father, Alhaji Umaru Jibrilla.To this end, 30 out of 32 heirs of the deceased have petitioned President Muhammadu Buhari, the Sultan of Sokoto, Alhaji Muhammad Sa’ad Abubakar III, and other eminent Nigerians over alleged plot by Bindow and another family member identified as Abubakar Jibrilla, to divert some of their inherited assets.
Those unhappy with the move by Bindow, according to the petition, include “four surviving wives, 16 surviving sons (with the exception of Mohammed Umaru Jibrilla Bindow, and Abubakar Jibrilla) and 12 surviving daughters” of the late business mogul.
The disputed assets, according to the letter dated August 30, 2016 and signed by Mustapha Umaru Jibrilla on behalf of the aggrieved family members; include a large commercial building at the Central Area and a shopping mall in Jabi.
Other assets in dispute, the petitioners claimed, include three residential properties in different places within the nation’s capital city.
According to the petition, when the family demanded for sharing of their late patriarch’s estate, upon his death in 2011, Bindow and Abubakar allegedly presented court papers suggesting that the deceased had given the Abuja properties to them as gifts.
“Our investigations in Abuja showed that the two actually forged a Deed of Gift and Certificate of Judgment of the Upper Area Court Abuja with number CV/88/2003 and another documents of Grade 1 Area Court, Abuja bearing number CV/88/2003. Curiously, both papers have the same numbers. On further probing, both courts confirmed to our lawyer that those file numbers were actually forged.
“The Upper Area Court in Wuse confirmed that suit numbered CV/88/2003 was actually between one Alhaji Abdullahi Funtua and Abdulrauf Mohammed, while the records of the Grade 1 Area Court record showed that the issue “never came” before it. The said forged number, in its record, was of a divorce case Mr. Udensi Orji and Uloma Orji. Neither Bindow, nor Abubakar, nor their lawyers are yet to explain to the Courts or anybody, this glaring inconsistency and sheer act of fraud.”
The governor’s relatives said though they have been challenging the governor in court, they are, however, disturbed “by the utterances of Bindow Jibrilla, who severally bragged that no one can take those properties away from him, and his effort to gag some of us who dare to talk about this issue.”
