The Federal High Court sitting in Abuja, on Monday, struck out the suit filed by one Johnmary Jideobi(lawyer), challenging the legality of parts of the Nigeria Sovereign Investment Authority (NSIA) Act as well as seeking the suspension of its Managing Director, Uche Orji.
Justice Ahmed Mohammed gave the ruling.
Jideobi on May 22, had prayed the court to suspend ” the Managing Director/Chief Executive Officer of the NSIA, Uche Orji, from office forthwith to pave way for a forensic audit into all the accounts and all the investments made by the 5th defendant commencing from June, 2011 to the date”.
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According to him, it would “enable the Nigerian nation to understand what has happened to their humongous wealth allocated to the 5th defendant (NSIA) in the midst of massive want, abject poverty and especially in this unfortunate era of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic further impoverishing the Nigerian people.”
The defendants in the suit are the President of the Senate, Ahmad Lawan (1st); Speaker of the House of Representatives, Femi Gbajabiamila (2nd); the National Assembly (3rd), Mohammed Sani-Omolori, National Assembly Clerk (4th), NSIA (5th), its Managing Director, Uche Orji (6th); and two others.
THE WHISTLER reported that Jideobi on July 8, filed a notice to discontinue the case without serving the defendants.
But counsel for the NSIA, Adegboyega Awomolo, objected to the notice, praying the court to strike out the suit while placing a fine of a million naira against the plaintiff.
“When we filed our defences and our objections, I believed he was scared; so he quickly filed a notice of discontinuance.
“And I said my client has spent so much money to preserve the authority, so for him to run away, I ask for millions of naira as cost,” Awomolo had told newsmen.
In his ruling today, Monday, Justice Mohammed struck out the suit on the grounds that the plantiff had applied for withdrawal within stipulated time.
Punch reports that the court, however, ruled that the two defendants having been made to file their defence before the application for the withdrawal of the suit was filed, were entitled to N150,000 cost to be paid to them by the plaintiff.