A Federal High Court in Abuja, presided by Justice James Omotosho, on Monday awarded a N10 million fine against the immediate-past Minister of State for Labour and Employment, Mr Festus Keyamo.
The fine was for filing a ‘frivolous suit’ against Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP)’s presidential candidate in the Feb. 25 election.
Omotosho who described the suit as “frivolous, vexatious and abuse of court processes, ordered that N5 million each be paid in favour of Abubakar and the Independent Corrupt Practises and Other Related Offences Commission and it should be paid “at 10 per cent per annum until the cost is finally liquidated.”
The order followed an oral application by counsel for Atiku, Benson Igbanoi, and that of the ICPC, Oluwakemi Odogun, asking for cost after the matter was dismissed.
According to News Agency of Nigeria report, Truth Live News learnt that the minister had filed a suit marked: FHC/ABJ/CS/84/2023 on Jan. 20, demanding the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC, ICPC, and the Code of Conduct Bureau, CCB, to probe and prosecute Abubakar.
Keyamo based his action on the ground of claims by one of Abubakar’s aides, Michael Achimugu, that between 1999 and 2007 when he was vice president, he (Achimugu) conspired with ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo to rip off the country using what he termed “Special Purpose Vehicles.”
But Atiku, through his lawyer, filed a notice of preliminary objection, seeking for an order dismissing the suit for being incompetent, lack of locus standi, want of jurisdiction and for non-disclosure of reasonable cause against him.
The EFCC, ICPC and the CCB, in their separate preliminary objections, also challenged the competency of the suit and the jurisdiction of the court.
However, Delivering the ruling, Justice Omotosho, said though the court did not say that the ex-minister did not have a right to write statutory agencies to investigate Abubakar, but that he had not shown why he was affected by Abubakar’s action.
“A citizen of a country has a right to report crime and that cannot be an infraction on fundamental rights of any person.
“But the complainant is to complain to the statutory agencies and not to drag the 1st defendant with the agencies to court to seek an order to compel the agencies to investigate the suspect,” he said.