have been of considerable weight, if the appellant had applied for an adjournment on account of the absence of his counsel from Court and he was refused the indulgence of such an adjournment. However, that is not the situation here. Therefore, I do not think that it is an ingenuous contention that in all situations and cases, an appeal predicated on a denial of fair hearing by a party such as the appellant herein, is a talisman or cure for all medicine to impugn and damnify a Court proceedings. This point was strongly and succinctly stated by the learned jurist, Niki Tobi, J. S. C., in Orugbo v. Una (2002) 16 NWLR (pt. 792) 172; (2002) 9 SCNJ 12 at page 17, that: "The true test of fair hearing is the impression of a reasonable person who was present at the trial whether from his observation, justice has been done in the case. See Mohammed v. Kano N. A. (1969) 1 All NLR 428; Funduk Engineering Ltd v. Mcarthur (1995) 4 NWLR (pt. 392) 640; Col. Yakubu (Rtd) v. Governor of Kogi State (1995) 8 NWLR (pt. 414) 386. The reasonable man should be a man who keeps his mind and reason within the bounds of reason and not extreme. And so if in the view of a reasonable man who watched the proceedings, the principle of fair hearing was not breached, an appellate Court will not nullify the proceedings. Fair hearing, which as entrenched in the Constitution, is based on determining or testing the constitutionality of a trial in terms of procedure. It is a very fundamental principle of law which the parties and the Courts are free to apply in relevant situations in relation to the facts of the case and not in vacuum. Accordingly, where the facts of the case reject the principle, the Court will have no competence to force the principle of law on the case." Furthermore, the learned Law Lord, at pages 36 - 37 of the report, concluded, thus: "Fair hearing is not a cut-and-dry principle which parties can, in the abstract, always apply to their comfort and convenience. It is a

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