A plaintiff who wants the Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Mr Abubakar Malami, stripped of his Senior Advocate of Nigeria rank, has alleged that public resources are being deployed to defend the suit on behalf of the minister.
The plaintiff, Johnmary Jideobi, stated this in an application he filed before the Federal High Court in Abuja where he is prosecuting his suit seeking sanction against Malami for Federal Government’s failure to obey six valid court orders.
The plaintiff, who also sought the referral of the minister to the Legal Practitioners Disciplinary Committee for disciplinary action, alleged that the minister’s justification of the continued detention of the immediate-past National Security Adviser, Sambo Dasuki, constituted a desecration of and an assault on the constitution which he ought to protect as a Senior Advocate of Nigeria and the AGF.
In the application, he prayed the court “to strike out the entire processes filed on behalf of the defendant in this suit for being incompetent as they were all filed by counsel who are incompetent in law to represent the defendant”.
He also sought another order “barring any legal practitioner in the employ of the Federal Government of Nigeria or any of its agencies from further filing any process or appearing in defence of the defendant in this suit”.
The plaintiff, who recalled how the Supreme Court on September 2, 2019 deprecated “the appearance of a Principal State Counsel from the Federal Ministry of Justice, Abdullahi Abubakar, for President Muhammadu Buhari in personal litigation” as a practice that must be discouraged.
The plaintiff’s counsel, Martin Okoye, of Johnmary C. Jideobi & Co, stated, “All the processes filed in this suit on behalf of the defendant (Malami) have been endorsed by legal practitioners in the employ of the Federal Ministry of Justice.
“Being a suit brought against the defendant in his private capacity as a high-ranking member and leader of the Nigerian Bar, the defendant is without powers to deploy the resources of the Nigerian state or the legal services of lawyers in the employ of the Federal Government of Nigeria to ward off this private suit as he is not entitled to same.”
The plaintiff’s lawyer added, “This court is under duty to carry out the directive of the highest court in the land, the Supreme Court, which is the practice of government-paid lawyers undertaking the defence of the defendant in a suit brought against him in his personal capacity.
But a counter-affidavit deposed to by an official of the Civil Litigation Department of the Federal Ministry of Justice, Thomas Etah, insisted that the issue being complained of in the plaintiff’s suit was not Malami’s personal matter but one that arose from the discharge of his official capacity.
Etah, who said he was briefed by a top lawyer in the Civil Litigation Department of the ministry, Mrs. Maimuna Shiru, stated in the counter-affidavit, “That the plaintiff/applicant in the suit sued the defendant in his official capacity.
“That upon careful perusal of the plaintiff’s/applicant’s originating summons dated July 27, 2018 and filed on the same date, the designation of the defendant shows the official status of the defendant as the Attorney-General of the Federation.”
Meanwhile, Justice Nkeonye Maha withdrew from the case on Friday following the allegation of likelihood of bias levelled against her by the plaintiff.
The plaintiff had petitioned the Chief Judge of the court, Justice John Tsoho, asking for the withdrawal of the case from Justice Maha and its reassignment to another judge, following a comment by the judge which the plaintiff perceived as pre-judging an application filed by Malami to contend that the court lacked jurisdiction to hear the case.
Justice Maha voluntarily withdrew from the case on Friday and returned the case to the Chief Judge for re-assignement to another judge.
Source: Punch
