The authors in the legal suit brought by a former governor of Rivers State alleging that his reputation was damaged by contents of their book, have appealed against the ruling of a Port-Harcourt High Court which restrained them from further publication of the book.
Prof. Chidi Odinkalu and Ms Ayisha Osori who co-authored a book on an alleged third term bid by former President Olusegun Obasanjo, claimed that a former governor of Rivers State, Sir (Dr.) Peter Odili allegedly funded a campaign for the third term bid of former President Obasanjo.
The co-authors of the book also alleged that Odili’s then Bauchi State counterpart, Adamu Muazu, was also part of the campaign to raise funds for the alleged third term bid of the former President.
They claimed that former President Olusegun Obasanjo spent millions of dollars to actualize his third term bid, which he wanted to do through a constitutional amendment but that the bill for the alleged extension of tenure was thrown out by the National Assembly.
The co-authors said in their book that the corporate trail “disclosed a deep financial bond between the president, Senator Ararume and the governments of Bauchi and Rivers State, then ruled, respectively by two of President Obasanjo’s closest governorship acolytes, Adamu Muazu and Peter Odili, who were at the centre of shadowy, complex, unlawful and almost certaining, criminal financial operations behind third term”.
The authors further said that “When all the cost elements, including the public relations campaigns, additional incentives, the work of the JCCR (Joint Committee on Constitutional Review of the National Assembly) and constitutional conference, as well as inevitable incentives to the security services, are added to the inducements proposed for legislators, it seems almost certain that the budget for the third term was in excess of $500million or half a billion dollars. None of this money was lawfully appropriated. They could only have been generated by theft, diversion or misappropriation of public resources”.
The authors also said in their book of how a politician in Rivers State, Marshal Harry, was assassinated few days after he had a misunderstanding with Odili.
Odili had said in his lawsuit that the authors of the book brought him into public ridicule in the way they portrayed him in their book “Too Good To Die: Third Term And The Myth Of The Indispensable Man In Africa”.
He also said that the book puts him in a bad light before reasonable people across the world who have read it, including eminent scholars in the United States of America.
He said that he took note of parts of the book where the authors narrated how Marshal Harry was assassinated shortly after they had a disagreement.
The book had cited a letter which the late politician had written to the Rivers State Police Command in which he expressed strong concerns about a growing level of intimidation and violent attacks against members of the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP) in Rivers State, saying that he believed that the attackers were loyalists of Odili and that they had the support of the police to unleash mayhem on members of ANPP ahead of 2003 elections in Rivers State.
Odili said in his lawsuit that the two co-authors of the book should make a public apology for the way they portrayed him in their book and also pay N1billiom as damages.
Meanwhile, counsel to the two co-authors who are defendants in the suit, Barrister Idaye Opi, said that his clients were appealing against the interlocutory order given by the presiding judge of a Port-Harcourt High Court, Justice Augusta Chukwu, which restrained the authors from further publication of the book.
Opi said: “The first one we are appealing against is about the interlocutory order she made restraining us (my clients) from further publication of the book. Of course, we are going to also follow up with the issues relating to her refusal to dismiss the action on ground of preliminary objection including the order she made refusing to withdraw from the case despite all the bias she has shown but for now, the first one we are taking… is the interlocutory order”.
He said that the appeal is filed at the Court of Appeal in Port-Harcourt.
Justice Augusta Chukwu who gave her ruling in March restrained the two co-authors of the book from further publication of the book.
She said that the facts before her showed that Dr. Odili, who is the plaintiff in the case, had not done anything “reprehensible”, saying that it was the duty of the court to protect the reputation of anyone who comes before it for justice.
She gave her ruling based on an application for interlocutory injunction brought by counsel to Dr. Odili, Kanu Agabi (SAN).
She also said in her ruling that she would not withdraw from the case as was requested by the defence counsel, saying that the counsel’s application for her to withdraw from the case lacked merit.
She further said that the suspicion by the defence counsel that she was biased in the case was baseless.
