For burly politician and businessman, Senator Buruji Kashamu, he eats and breathes controversies. Due to his extravagant lifestyle, the controversial socialite, who represented Ogun East Senatorial District at the National Assembly between 2015 and 2019, has been embroiled in various crises with the Federal Government and some of its agencies since 2014, chiefly an attempt to extradite him to the United States over alleged drug offences —charges he denies. He has challenged the extradition moves. Kashamu had secured two orders from a Federal High Court between 2014 and 2017 restraining Federal Government, through its agencies, from carrying out his extradition to the United States. However, the Court of Appeal had on May 4, 2018 cleared the coast for the federal government to extradite Kashamu who had engaged government in a long drawn legal battle since 2014. The appellate court in the two separate judgments voided and set aside all orders made by the Federal High Court restraining the government from proceeding with the extradition.
The appeal court said that an affidavit deposed to by Kashamu on the issue was worthless and not in compliance with Evidence Act because the former senator himself claimed that he was told by several persons who were not called to testify in court. Consequently, the order of injunction stopping the extraction process was voided and set aside.
Justice Joseph Ikyeghi had agreed with counsel to the Federal Government, Chief Emeka Ngige, SAN, that a statutory body like the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) cannot be prohibited from performing its statutory functions on hearsays and speculations as in the instant case. But the Supreme Court is set to review the two judgments delivered in favour of the Federal Government by the Lagos division of the Court of Appeal on May 4, 2018. Kashamu had in his notices of appeal to Supreme Court complained that the Court of Appeal erred in law by voiding and setting aside the two judgments of the Federal High court which barred Federal Government from extraditing him to America. The ex-senator is praying the apex court to set aside the decisions of the Court of Appeal as they affected him. But Federal Government through the Attorney General of the Federation has responded with a counter prayer that the Supreme Court should uphold the judgments of the Court of Appeal which cleared the coast for his extradition.
Spotlight gathered that if the Apex Court successfully vacates all legal encumbrances and Kashamu is sent to the United States and found guilty, it will be a spectacular fall for a man whose lifestyle brand has gained iniquitous recognition. Kashamu is best known for hotel and auto merchandising. However, the businessman’s more recent venture into gaming business has courted controversy. Kashamu has turned a whistleblower for the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, in December 2019 petition asking the anti-graft agency to investigate multiple allegations of billions of naira tax fraud and economic sabotage levelled against some rivals in the gaming business.
While still battling with the crises with the Federal Government alongside that of his political and business rivals, a Civil Society Organisation named ‘Centre Against Injustice And Domestic Violence’ is set to compound Kashamu’s woes. The group has petitioned the Attorney General of the Federation, seeking prosecution of Kashamu over the various versions of video in circulation on the social media where Kashamu was caught spraying bundles of naira notes on a popular musician at a public function. The group led by one Comrade Gbenga Soloki, was riled by the wanton display of vulgar opulence by Kashamu and called on the security operatives to arrest him and prosecute the Ogun State-born politician for such social misdemeanor.