The Federal High Court in Abuja has fixed September 29 to hear a motion filed by the Osun State Government challenging the court\u2019s jurisdiction in a suit concerning withheld local government funds.<\/p>\n
The state government is objecting to the matter being heard in Abuja, insisting that the case should be transferred back to the Federal High Court in Osogbo now that the court\u2019s vacation period ended on September 16.<\/p>\n
The objection, filed by senior lawyer Musibau Adetumbi, SAN, rests on two main grounds:<\/p>\n
\u2022 The fiat granted to the Attorney General of the Federation (AGF) allowing the case to be heard in Abuja during the vacation period is no longer valid since the vacation has ended.<\/p>\n
\u2022 A letter purportedly from the Chief Judge\u2019s office assigning the matter to Justice Emeka Nwite in Abuja is being challenged on the basis of its authenticity.<\/p>\n
Adetumbi questioned the legitimacy of the letter, noting it was signed by someone described as the “Personal Assistant to the Personal Assistant” of the Chief Judge\u2014whom he described as a \u201cbusybody\u201d with no legal standing to sign such an official document. He urged the court to determine the validity of the letter before hearing the substantive suit.<\/p>\n
However, opposing counsel\u2014including Dr. Muritala Abdulrasheed, SAN (representing the Central Bank of Nigeria) and Alhaji Tajudeen Oladoja, SAN (counsel for the Accountant General of the Federation)\u2014argued that Osun’s motion is a deliberate tactic to delay the case. They pointed out that the tenure of the APC-elected local government chairmen and councillors will expire on October 22, warning that the case could become academic if not heard promptly.<\/p>\n
After hearing arguments, Justice Nwite ruled that the court will first address the jurisdictional issues raised by the Osun State Government on\u00a0September 29\u00a0before proceeding to the substantive claims.<\/p>\n
Earlier in the proceedings, the judge struck out the name of the Attorney General of the Federation from the list of defendants, following a formal withdrawal of the case against him by the plaintiff. The court was informed that a related matter involving the AGF is currently pending before the Supreme Court.<\/p>\n
Background of the Suit<\/p>\n
The case was filed by the Osun State Attorney General, Oluwole Jimi-Bada, on behalf of the state government. It seeks to\u00a0restrain the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN)\u00a0from opening or operating local government accounts for chairmen and councillors elected in\u00a0October 2022\u00a0under the\u00a0All Progressives Congress (APC).<\/p>\n
The state contends that those officials were\u00a0sacked by a judgment of the Federal High Court, which was later upheld by the\u00a0Court of Appeal, and therefore should no longer have access to public funds.<\/p>\n
Key reliefs sought by the Osun government include:<\/p>\n
\u2022 An\u00a0interim injunction\u00a0stopping the CBN and Accountant General from disbursing allocations to the sacked APC chairmen and councillors.<\/p>\n
\u2022 A\u00a0prohibition\u00a0against operating or maintaining accounts in their names.<\/p>\n
The October 2022 local government elections in question were conducted with only APC candidates participating.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Federal High Court in Abuja has fixed September 29 to hear a motion filed by the Osun State Government challenging the court\u2019s jurisdiction in a suit concerning withheld local government funds. The state government is objecting to the matter being heard in Abuja, insisting that the case should be transferred back to the Federal […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":61675,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[352,2684,1082],"class_list":["post-95161","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-news","tag-court","tag-lg","tag-osun"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95161","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=95161"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/95161\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/61675"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=95161"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=95161"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=95161"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}