ICPC to challenge Appeal Court ruling on jurisdiction in ex-UNICAL dean’s case

ABUJA — The Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) is preparing to challenge a Court of Appeal ruling on jurisdiction in the long-running sexual harassment case against Professor Cyril Ndifon.

For the suspended and now-convicted former Dean of Law at the University of Calabar (UNICAL), a fresh legal twist in a saga that has run since 2023 is about to emerge.

ValidViewNetwork can confirm that the jurisdiction question stems from Ndifon’s own appeal, in which his lawyer, Joe Agi SAN, has long argued that the Federal High Court in Abuja improperly assumed jurisdiction over charges he says were not initiated through due process.

Furthermore, he stated that constitutional privacy protections should have shielded the phone evidence at the heart of the case.

Findings show the case has moved through nearly every stage of Nigeria’s criminal process: Ndifon’s no-case submission was dismissed in March 2024, after which Justice James Omotosho ordered him to enter a defence.

His co-defendant and lawyer, Sunny Anyanwu, was granted leave to appeal that dismissal; and in July 2026, Omotosho ultimately convicted Ndifon on two counts, sentencing him to a combined five years’ imprisonment, while acquitting Anyanwu of all charges for lack of established links to the offences.

According to reports gotten by ValidViewNetwork, the jurisdiction ruling ICPC intends to challenge appears to revisit ground the trial court had already settled.

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Omotosho had earlier held, citing the Supreme Court’s decision in Aweto v. FRN, that the Federal High Court retained exclusive jurisdiction over matters involving federal agencies like ICPC under Section 251 of the Constitution.

A case that keeps generating new fronts

ValidViewNetwork gathered that the trial itself produced its own dramatic moments, including testimony from the ICPC’s star witness, identified only as TKJ.

She told the court she initially omitted the full extent of the alleged harassment from her original statement “out of shame and fear.”

With ICPC now moving to contest the appellate jurisdiction ruling, a case many assumed had reached its conclusion with Ndifon’s conviction looks set to generate further legal wrangling. ValidViewNetwork reports.