On 26 August 2026, the Accra High Court declined to postpone the trial of former National Food and Buffer Stock Company chief executive Hanan Abdul-Wahab Aludiba and his wife, Faiza Seidu Wuni, until 19 October. Counsel for Mr Aludiba had sought the longer adjournment while an application to stay proceedings awaited consideration by the Court of Appeal. The court instead fixed 29 and 30 September 2026 for the next hearings.
The request before the court
The defence relied on the pending appellate application and on medical reports showing that lawyers for both accused persons had been excused from work. Deputy Attorney-General Dr Justice Srem-Sai opposed the longer postponement. The court had previously adjourned the matter when defence lawyers did not attend and had required the medical material to be put before it.
Justice Francis Apangabuno Achibonga considered the request for time until October alongside the lawyers' reported illness. According to the published account, he found no basis in the applicable rules for treating the filing of an application to stay proceedings as an automatic stay of the trial. Postponing the matter until after the date sought in the appellate process would, in substance, have granted the extended pause the defence requested.
Why a shorter adjournment was granted
The judge accepted the medical reports for the purpose of a limited postponement. He observed that the earlier statements about counsel's availability did not rule out a later illness. The reports were presented as the lawyers' first requests for an adjournment on health grounds, and he found no basis on the material before him to treat those requests as a tactic to delay the case.
The distinction matters: an application for a stay asks another court to order a pause; filing it does not itself settle whether the trial court must stop. The High Court's ruling addressed the timetable, leaving the appellate application to be decided in its own proceedings. It did not determine the criminal charges. The scheduled September hearing gives counsel time to recover while allowing the trial to continue without the lengthy adjournment requested.
Source
Graphic Online, “Hanan trial: Court adjourns case to September 29” (26 August 2026).