The Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Mohammed Adoke, SAN, on Wednesday surprisingly withdrew the N10.2bn libel suit he filed against a former member of the House of Representatives, Dino Melaye, before an Abuja High Court.
The AGF’s lawyer, Zekeri Garuba, did not give any reason for the development while moving the application for the withdrawal before Justice Olasimbo Goodluck.
The lawyer only stated that his client, the AGF, instructed him to withdraw the case.
He therefore applied that it be struck out, a move which was not opposed by Melaye’s lawyer, Moses Ideh.
The judge subsequently struck out the case.
It would be recalled that Adoke had in May 2013 sued Melaye and his group, the Registered Trustees of Anti-corruption Network, over a petition forwarded to President Goodluck Jonathan about him.
The AGF claimed he was defamed in the petition.
He accused Melaye of damaging his reputation in an April 12, 2013 publication where the former lawmaker accused him of corrupt practices including obstructing justice to favour of corrupt elements and abusing his powers as the minister of justice.
In the petition Melaye had raised several allegations bordering on abuse of office against Adoke, including the $180m Halliburton scandal and the return of the Vaswani brothers to Nigeria after an alleged N2.5bn tax evasion saga.
The former lawmaker also accused the AGF of dereliction of duty by not applying for the dismissal of Justice Charles Archibong of the Federal High Court on the grounds of shoddy prosecution after he dismissed the N10bn money laundering charge brought against a former Managing Director of Intercontinental Bank Plc, Erastus Akingbola.
The AGF had informed the court that the words used by Melaye’s group in the publication conveyed the impression that he was a dishonourable person who associated with criminals and economic saboteurs.
Noting that as a result of the ‘false and defamatory publication,’ his ‘hard-earned reputation, character and achievements’ have been severely tarnished, Adoke asked the court to award N10.2b damages against Melaye, as well as N200m as cost of filing the suit.
Five Senior Advocates of Nigeria had represented the AGF in court at the early stage of the case, but the proceedings eventually slowed down until Wednesday’s unexplained withdrawal of the suit.
