Court strikes out suit against ALGON president

By BASHIR ADEFAKA

A Federal High Court sitting in Abuja has struck out a suit by one Mohammed Abubakar in the name of Board of Trustees of the Association of Local Governments of Nigeria (ALGON), challenging the legality of Kolade Alabi-led ALGON executive.

Justice I. E. Ekwo, in a ruling on Tuesday, found the case as incompetent.

The court held that the ex parte order obtained by Mohammed Abubakar, since March 29, 2021, has lapsed and is no longer competent.

Justice Ekwo stated that since the order was granted, Mohammed Abubakar neither filed the substantive application for judicial review (granted in the order) nor sought an extension of the ex parte order.

This was despite the fact the Mohammed Abubakar was given seven days from  March 29, 2021 to file the said substantive application.
Justice Ekwo frowned upon and completely rejected as “unorthodox and unknown to the Rules of Court”, Mohammed Abubakar’s attempt to bring in one Abdullahi Shuaibu Maje as a co-applicant to the ex parte process by which Leave was obtained. The court stated that it is not possible to amend or join a party to processes already spent and based on which Leave had already been granted.

Justice Ekwo dismissed Mohammed Abubakar’s motion to amend and to join Abdullahi Shuaibu Maje.

The court also came to the conclusion that the ex parte order having lapsed, could no longer be renewed and therefore the substantive suit itself was also incompetent, invalid and liable to be struck out, hence Justice Ekwo, in his wisdom struck the suit out in its entirety.

Reacting to the ruling, National Publicity Secretary of ALGON, Mr Solomon Onah, described it as a welcome development.
Onah said the Kolade Alabi-led ALGON executive has been vindicated, hoping that the ruling would put an end to the “shenanigans of the Abdullahi Maje group.”

“As it stands, the case filed by Mohammed Abubakar falsely in the name of Board of Trustees and supported by Abdullahi Shuaibu Maje with an ex parte order obtained by them on March 29, 2021, which they have bandied about in the traditional and on the social media and also presented to various authorities, has now been fully thrown out by the Federal High Court ably presided over by Hon. Justice I E. Ekwo.

“We hope the group will retrace their steps, apologise for the unnecessary disturbance of the public peace and join the Alabi team to move the association forward. We have said it repeatedly that there is nothing like their so-called Interim Management Committee (IMC) and the court has validated our claims,” Onah said.