Stephen Odey to pay N3m as Appeal court upholds Jarigbe as Cross senator

The Abuja division of the Court of Appeal on Saturday dismissed an appeal challenging the election of Senator Agom Jarigbe as the senator representing Cross Rivers North.

While describing the appeal filed by Chief Joe Agi as frivolous, the apex court awarded a punitive cost of N2 million against him and his political platform, the All Progressives Congress (APC).

The cost against Agi was for engaging in abuse of court in their application asking the court to set aside its earlier judgment.

The money is to be paid to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its candidate in the by-election, Mr Agom Jarigbe.

The appellate court imposed the fine on the APC and its candidate, Agi, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria SAN for filing what the court considered as a frivolous application.

APC and Agi in their joint application had asked the court to review and set aside a judgment delivered by the Calabar division of the court.

Their grouse was that the judgment delivered on July 30 in Calabar violated section 285 of the 1999 constitution having been done without jurisdiction.

They claimed among others that Agom Jarigbe who was returned as winner of the bye-election did not participate in all the stages of the election as required by law.

The appellants asked the court to set aside the judgment on account of being a nullity.

However, in a ruling on the application, the President of the Court, Justice Monica Domgbem-Mensen, dismissed it for being frivolous and lacking in merit.

Justice Domgbem-Mensen who led a panel of five Justices in the matter held that the appeal of the two appellants was brought in bad faith as It constituted a dangerous invitation to the court to set a bad precedent.

Citing section 246 of the 1999 constitution, the Court of Appeal held that its judgment once delivered diligently cannot be set aside except where such judgment is fundamentally defective.

In the instant application, the Court of Appeal President held that both APC and Agi failed to show the fundamental defect in the judgment they challenged.

Nigeria News: Gov El-Rufai jets out to London amid reports of ill-health

She further held that the two applicants did not show the court any aspects of the law that empowered it to review its own judgment and set It aside other than where clerical typographical errors are discovered.

The court, therefore, held that the application is a gross abuse of court process, malicious and brought in bad faith to overreach the court.

‘In totality, the application by the appellants is worthy of nothing but dismissal and I hereby dismiss It for want of merit.

While dismissing the application, the court upheld the July 30 2021 judgment that recognised Jarigbe as the Senator for Cross Rivers North Senatorial district.

A separate application filed by ousted senator Stephen Odey of the Peoples Democratic Party PDP was dismissed on the same ground that the court has no known law to set aside its own judgment.

The appeal court President ordered Odey to pay a sum of one million naira each to Joe Agi, APC and Jarigbe who are the 1st, 2nd, and 3rd respondent’s respectively in the application.

Newsflash Nigeria is an online newspaper that is developed and written exclusively for Nigerians. It’s packed with up-to-the-minute Local and National Economy News, Share & Capital Market, Health, Sports, Education, Technology, Business and Opinions.

To make further advert enquiries or place an order, please contact us at [email protected] and +2348053316946 and WhatsApp number 08033546732