{"id":92802,"date":"2025-01-27T14:00:49","date_gmt":"2025-01-27T14:00:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=92802"},"modified":"2025-01-27T14:00:49","modified_gmt":"2025-01-27T14:00:49","slug":"alleged-defamation-afe-babalola-to-withdraw-suit-against-farotimi","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=92802","title":{"rendered":"Alleged defamation: Afe Babalola to withdraw suit against Farotimi"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Legal icon and elder statesman, Afe Babalola, says he is ready to withdraw his criminal defamation suit against rights activist, Dele Farotimi.<\/p>\n

Mr Babalola had sued Mr Farotimi in an Ado Ekiti Magistrates\u2019 Court following Farotimi\u2019s publication of a book which allegedly defamed him.<\/p>\n

Mr Babalola\u2019s decision to withdraw his suit followed the visit to him by the Ooni of Ife, Oba Adeyeye Ogunwusi, on Sunday night.<\/p>\n

The visit by the Ooni to the elder statesman\u2019s residence at Afe Babalola University Ado Ekiti, ABUAD, was to plead with him to withdraw the suit.<\/p>\n

The Ooni, who arrived at ABUAD at about 10.30 pm, was accompanied by other top Yoruba traditional rulers.<\/p>\n

Traditional rulers, who came in company with the Ooni, included the Ewi of Ado-Ekiti, Ogoga of Ikere-Ekiti, Oloye of Oye-Ekiti, Ajero of Ijero-Ekiti and Olojudo of Ido- Ekiti among others.<\/p>\n

Speaking at the meeting, Mr Babalola said he had received several letters as well as calls on the issue from eminent Nigerians asking him to withdraw the suit.<\/p>\n

They included former President Olusegun Obasanjo and Bishop Hassan Kukah<\/p>\n

The Senior Advocate of Nigeria said he had no choice than to succumb to the latest pleas by the visiting traditional rulers.<\/p>\n

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He stressed that he had nothing to gain in Mr Farotimi being jailed.<\/p>\n

Mr Babalola assured the traditional rulers that he would direct his lawyers to withdraw the case.<\/p>\n

Earlier, the Ooni had said Yoruba leaders and the traditional institution had been following the development keenly.<\/p>\n

The traditional ruler said that he and others resolved to intervene so that Babalola, \u201d can pardon his son, Farotimi.\u201d<\/p>\n

He commended the legal icon for building his integrity over the years and urged him not to relent following the development.<\/p>\n

NAN reports that the meeting ended at about midnight.<\/p>\n

Mr Babalola recently dragged Farotimi before an Ekiti Magistrates\u2019 court, claiming criminal defamation in the latter\u2019s controversial book, \u201dNigeria and its Criminal Justice system\u201d.<\/p>\n

The court granted Farotimi N30million bail.<\/p>\n

\u25cf By NAN<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/article>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Legal icon and elder statesman, Afe Babalola, says he is ready to withdraw his criminal defamation suit against rights activist, Dele Farotimi. Mr Babalola had sued Mr Farotimi in an Ado Ekiti Magistrates\u2019 Court following Farotimi\u2019s publication of a book which allegedly defamed him. Mr Babalola\u2019s decision to withdraw his suit followed the visit to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":92331,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[1249,6877,4751],"class_list":["post-92802","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-babalola","tag-farotimi","tag-withdrawal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92802","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=92802"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/92802\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/92331"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=92802"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=92802"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=92802"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}