Court strikes out corruption suit against Kachikwu

ABUJA — REPRIEVE has come the way of the Minister of State for Petroleum Resources, Dr. Ibe Kachikwu, following the striking out of a suit seeking an order of mandamus to compel anti-corruption agencies in the country to investigate and prosecute Kachikwu for various alleged infractions in the declaration of assets.
The case was struck out yesterday.

Earlier in the proceedings, Counsel to Kachikwu, Dr. Muiz Banire and Paul Erokoro, both Senior Advocates of Nigeria (SAN) had sought the dismissal of the suit but the judge, Justice Folashade Ogunbanjo, in declining to make the order, premised same on the absence of the motion seeking dismissal in the court file.

An enrolled order of the court bearing the stamp of the Federal High Court and the signature of the registrar with October 15, 2018 date, showed that Justice Ogunbanjo had made the order on October 10.

The plaintiff, KHRFI, through its ex parte application filed on August 23, 2018, had sought the court’s leave to commence a suit seeking Kachikwu’s probe for the various allegations.

Kachikwu was sued alongside the Ministry of Petroleum Resources, the Code of Conduct Bureau, the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, President Muhammadu Buhari, and the Attorney General of the Federation, Mr Abubakar Malami (SAN).

The plaintiff, through his lawyer, Okere Nnamdi, asked the court, in the substantive suit, to conduct a judicial review of the administrative action/inaction of the defendants to perform their constitutional and statutory mandates and obligations in connection with the investigation and prosecution of Kachikwu and also sought leave to commence the suit on October 10.

But the suit was yesterday thrown out by the same court, thus vindicating Kachikwu, who had at various times insisted on compliance with the relevant law and rules in the declaration of his assets as against speculations flying around that his declaration was fraudulent.