Muhammed are one and the same person and the court held
that they are one and the same person. The defendant did not
deny that the name of the charge was not his name when his
plea was taken.
Furthermore, the defence counsel has also argued that PW3
is not the maker of the statement, that argument is frivolous
because the statement was made to the IPO through whom it
was sought to be tendered. The provisions of Section 83 (c) of
the Evidence Act 2011, does not apply. An IPO can tender all
documents received by him in the course of investigation and
the statement sought to be tendered was made to him in the
course of investigation and he is the only person who can
tender it because he has also informed the court that it was
him who wrote the words of caution before he volunteered
his statement. The interpreter is not the proper person to
tender the statement because counsel did not site any
authority that interpreter must tender the statement as the
proper person to tender it, is the investigating officer as it was
to him that the statement was made by the defendant. The
interpreter only recorded what the defendant has said.
As to the argument that the language that was interpreted
which is the Hausa language, the Supreme Court stated that
when a word of caution was administered in English
language and the defendant signed to have understood it, he
cannot be heard to say that he doesn’t understand the
language. See Asugyo V. State (2016) LPELR 40597 Pgs 1516 Paragraph E-D.
In this case the cautionary were administered in English
language and the witness signed to have understood same
after it was translated into Hausa to the defendant and the
defendant thereafter made his statement in Hausa language
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