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Innoson withdraws ex parte application against police, GTB

By Joseph Onyekwere
23 December 2017   |   4:22 am
Innoson Nigeria Limited and its Chief Executive Officer/Managing Director, Innocent Chukwuma, has withdrawn the fundamental right enforcement suit...

Innocent Chukwuma

Innoson Nigeria Limited and its Chief Executive Officer/Managing Director, Innocent Chukwuma, has withdrawn the fundamental right enforcement suit he filed against the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and five other respondents.

Other respondents in the ex-parte application suit, marked FHC/L/CS/1962/17, are the Federal Republic of Nigeria, Attorney General of the Federation (AGF), Inspector General of Police (IGP), Nigeria Police Force, and Guaranty Trust Bank (GTB).

When the matter was called, counsel to GTB, Adebowale Kamoru, citing several Supreme Court’s authority, insisted that his client must be heard in the ex-parte application.

But counsel to Innoson, MacCharty Mbadugha, opposed his position.

At the resumed hearing of the application yesterday, Mbadugha told the court of his clients’ intention to withdraw the suit due to the filing of a counter by the sixth respondent, GTB.

“Yesterday, the sixth respondent was represented on ex-parte application, counsel made submission and informed the court that the sixth defendant had filed a counter to the ex-parte application.

“We brought this to the knowledge of our client and he instructed us to withdraw it and find out why due process was not followed.”

In response, Kamoru said they were not opposing the withdrawal of the suit, but that they would await the applicants’ investigation on how his client got to know about the suit.

Ruling on the application, Justice Hadizat Rabiu-Shagari granted Innoson’s request.

In a telephone chat with The Guardian, Chukwuma lamented his arrest by the EFCC and subsequent detention for three days, saying he was yet to be told the real reasons for his arrest.

He said: “Up till now, I don’t know what happened or the reasons why I was arrested. It was only EFCC and the managing director of GTB that know what happened.

“I won a case against GTB in courts in Ibadan and Enugu. The GTB has taken the matter to the Supreme Court.

“To come to arrest me over the matter is very wrong. The matter is still in appeal court in Lagos. Nigerians are now saying that the EFCC is working for the GTB, not Nigerians.”

He said that he was, however, not going to take any legal action against the GTB concerning the matter, adding: “I want the government to handle the matter. I do not want to handle the matter myself.

“I was treated like a criminal. My children were in the house with some little children. The worst thing is that when my wife asked them why they wanted to arrest me, they slapped her and threw tear gas in my house. I was on a knickers and a shirt for three days.

“To call the EFCC to the matter that is still in court is not necessary. I want to say that this is not a tribal matter; all Nigerians supported me in this matter.

“They jumped into my house around 5.30 a.m. They did not come with any identity card. They did not invite me to come and answer any question. If they have called me, I would have answered them,” he said.

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