UNICAL suspended dean, Prof. Ndifon, sentenced to prison for sexual harassment

The Federal High Court in Abuja has sentenced the suspended Dean of the Faculty of Law at the University of Calabar (UNICAL), Prof. Cyril Ndifon, to five years in prison for sexually harassing female students.

Delivering the judgment on Monday, Justice James Omotosho found Ndifon guilty on two of the four counts brought against him by the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC).

Meanwhile, the court discharged and acquitted his co-defendant and lawyer, Mr. Sunny Anyanwu, who had faced allegations of attempting to pervert the course of justice.

The court stated that the evidence presented by the prosecution was insufficient to prove that Anyanwu committed any offence.

While Justice Omotosho sentenced Prof. Ndifon to two years in prison in one of the counts of the charge that was sustained by the court, he was handed five-year jail term on another count.

The court held that both sentences would run concurrently.

The ICPC had alleged that Ndifon, while serving as the Dean of the Faculty of Law at UNICAL, harassed his female students by demanding explicit photos from them.

He was alleged to have asked a particular female diploma student whose identity was replaced with the pseudonym ‘TJK’, to send him “pornographic, indecent and obscene photographs of herself” through WhatsApp chats.

The said student was among the four witnesses the ICPC produced that testified before the court.

Allegations against the defendants bordered on sexual harassment, cybercrime, and attempting to pervert the course of justice.

After the ICPC closed its case on February 14, 2024, the embattled Dean filed a no-case-sunmission which the court dismissed on March 6, 2024, and ordered him to open his defence to the charge.

In his defence, Prof. Ndifon testified as his own witness, while one CSP Babagana Mingali, a forensic analyst at the laboratory of the Office of the National Security Adviser, ONSA, also appeared as second witness, DW-2.

While denying the allegation against him, the 1st defendant insisted that the prosecution failed to by way of any credible evidence, establish a prima-facie case against him.

He contended that the totality of the testimony of all the witnesses, among whom included the alleged victim, were not sufficient or such that any court could rely upon to make a conviction.