A forensic examiner told the FCT High Court in Abuja on Monday that a passport bearing the name Tali Shani, presented in a London property ownership case involving senior lawyer Mike Ozekhome, was forged.
Bamaiyi Mairiga, an official of the Department of Forensic Examination of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), said, “In this particular case, the data page of the Nigerian international e-passport bearing the surname Shani, other names Tali and passport number A07535463 is a forged data page.”
Mr. Mairiga is the second prosecution witness in the alleged forgery case, and his testimony speaks to one of the charges the Office of the Attorney-General of the Federation (AGF) preferred against Mr. Ozekhome and his co-defendant, Ponfa Useni.
Mr. Useni is a son of the late Jeremiah Useni, who served as the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) during the regime of former military dictator, the late Sani Abacha.
The older Mr. Useni, who died in January 2025, owned the London property in question under the fictitious name Tali Shani, and his purported attempt to transfer its ownership to Mr. Ozekhome allegedly led to the presentation of documents which the property tribunal in London found to be forged to support the false identity of Tali Shani.
On February 27, the Office of the AGF arraigned Messrs Ozekhome and Useni on 12 counts of forgery and impersonation.
According to the charges, the defendants conspired in 2020 alongside the late Jeremiah Useni, a retired general, and made “a false” Nigerian passport with number A07535463 and the name Tali Shani, purporting it to have been issued by the Nigeria Immigration Service, to claim a property in the United Kingdom.
Similarly, the prosecution charged them with “using a false passport to facilitate the claim of the property.”
The prosecution also alleged that Mr. Ozekhome helped Ponfa Useni to impersonate Tali Shani in 2020. Together, they allegedly created a fake “Irrevocable Power of Attorney” to help Mr. Ozekhome claim the property.
They denied all the charges.
The prosecution witness, Mr. Mairiga, took the court through the forensic examination that allegedly revealed the Tali Shani passport to be fake.
He said that in February, the forensic department of the EFCC received a request from the Director of Investigations of the EFCC, Abdulkareem Chukkol, to analyse the data page of a passport.
He said the passport bore the name Tali Shani with passport number A07535463.
According to him, the forensic department analysed the passport using the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) international procedure.
Three technologies were used: Keesing Technologies Document Checker (KTDC), VSC 8000 ICAO Optical Character Recognition (OCR) E-Passport Checker, and Manual Publication/Calculation, the witness said.
He added that the analysis of the data page was carried out to examine the Check Digits (CD). The witness explained that the CD is a single numerical character from 0 to 9 placed after the Date of Birth (DOB), Date of Expiry (DOE) and passport number to check the accuracy and integrity of the data provided on the visual inspection zone of the passport and ensure it matches with that of the machine-readable zones.
He explained that the significance of the CD is to assist immigration officers, border control officers and forensic document examiners in identifying forged and counterfeited data pages.
Mr. Mairiga explained to the court that the KTDC was used to verify the accuracy of the information on the visual inspection zone of the data page, where the image holder on the passport appears and other personalised data are shown.
The forensic department used the VSC 8000 ICAO OCR E-Passport feature to verify the genuineness of the DOB, DOE and passport number.
The Manual Publication/Calculation requires the conversion of letters to numerals and the multiplication of the data on the passport.
The forensic department placed the passport under these analyses. The report “shows that the international passport bearing the surname Shani and other name, Tali, with passport number A07535463 has been digitally altered.”
“The Check Digits for the passport number, DOB, and DOE of the passport are incorrect, and the passport data page has been forged/counterfeited to reflect the holder as Shani Tali,” Mr. Mairiga said.
Leading the witness in evidence, the Director of Public Prosecutions of the Federation (DPPF), Rotimi Oyedepo, SAN, tendered the forensic report and charts as evidence before the court. Lawyers to Messrs Ozekhome and Ponfa did not oppose the documents.
He noted that while his department received a copy of the data page and not the original, the team had no difficulty analysing it because it was legible “for everyone to see.”
Earlier in Monday’s proceedings, the witness listed his 13 qualifications.
These include a bachelor’s degree in Chemistry, a basic forensic document examination certificate from the European Union (EU), and an advanced forensic document examination certificate from Switzerland.
Others include an advanced certificate in fingerprint identification science from the National Crimes and Records Bureau in New Delhi, India, a two-year mentorship residency in document examination, and many others from the United Kingdom, the Netherlands, the United States of America and Interpol.
During cross-examination, Tayo Oyetibo, SAN, asked if most of the courses were short. The witness said some courses ranged from two to six weeks; however, his degree lasted four years, he had a two-year uninterrupted mentorship and a year-long postgraduate diploma.
He also noted that he was awarded certificates in all the courses.
Mr. Oyetibo asked the witness how his first degree related to the examination of documents. The witness said he took mathematics as a chemistry student because document examination involves calculation.
He also referenced reactions to chemicals which deal with ink analysis. Narrowing it down to the analysis of the disputed passport, Mr. Oyetibo asked the witness if ink analysis was conducted. Mr. Mairiga replied, “No.”
“The request was clear: to compare the content of the machine-readable zone and visual inspection zone to determine if they are a match.”
Thereafter, the trial judge, Chizoba Oji, adjourned the matter until June 29 for further cross-examination.
The first prosecution witness, a Nigerian Immigration Service (NIS) officer, testified in March that a passport bearing the name Tali Shani was fake.
Akim Aridegbe, a principal staff officer to the Comptroller-General of the NIS, said the passport was not issued by the NIS.
Despite the passport sharing features of a genuine copy, it had no record in the NIS database, Mr. Aridegbe said.
Mr. Ozekhome’s prosecution in Nigeria stems from a London tribunal’s judgment that blocked him from claiming a property in North London in September 2025.
In August 2021, Mr. Ozekhome sought to transfer the property to his name, claiming it was a gift from a man who presented himself as Tali Shani in appreciation for legal services.
But this was challenged in September 2022 by Westfields Solicitors, claiming to represent “Ms. Tali Shani,” who insisted she was the registered owner of the property since 1993 and had never signed any transfer.
Ruling on the dispute, Judge Paton of the UK tribunal held that the house was secretly bought in 1993 by the late Mr. Useni, former Nigerian Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, using a false identity.
According to the tribunal, Mr. Ozekhome’s steps to claim the property were built on a network of fraud, impersonation, and forged documents. Still, it concluded that the late Mr. Useni was the genuine purchaser of the property in 1993.
Similarly, the London tribunal uncovered fraudulent Nigerian identity records, including a passport, a National Identification Number (NIN), and a Tax Identification Number (TIN) allegedly generated with the connivance of corrupt officials at the National Identity Management Commission (NIMC), the Nigeria Immigration Service, and the Federal Inland Revenue Service.
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