Justice Yetunde Adesanya of the Lagos High Court, Ikeja has ordered the State House of Assembly to halt the ongoing probe of former Governor Akinwunmi Ambode, ending the determination of the suit he filed against the Assembly. Ambode had instituted a suit against the State House of Assembly, its Speaker, Mr. Mudashiru Obasa, and the House Clerk, Mr.A.A Sanni. Other respondents to the suit are
Mr.Fatai Mojeed, the Chairman of the Ad-hoc Committee set up by the House to probe the procurement of buses and eight members of the Committee. The members of the Ad-hoc committee are; Mr.Gbolahan Yishawu, Mr.A.A Yusuf, Mr.Yinka Ogundimu, Mrs.Mojisola Meranda, Mr.M.L Makinde, Mr.Kehinde Joseph, Mr.Temitope Adewale, and. lanrewaju Afinni. On October 29, following a Motion Exparte moved by the counsel to Ambode, Mr.Tayo Oyetibo, (SAN), Justice Adesanya, ordered that the lawmakers should appear before the court on October 30 in connection with the ongoing probe. During yesterday’s proceedings, the lawmakers were absent in court.
They were, however, represented by a counsel, Mrs.Adenike Oshinowo. Ambode’s counsel, Oyetibo, informed the court that the respondents had been served with the court processes on Tuesday as ordered by the court. “Your lordship directed that we serve the respondents with the court’s processes which has been done. We are ready for the motion on notice filed on October 28, and all the originating processes have been served,
” Oyetibo said. In her response, Oshinowo informed the court that the lawmakers would be opposing the Motion and that the respondents were served with the court documents very late on Tuesday. “We were served the Motion on Notice very late yesterday ( Tuesday) , y lord and we shall be opposing the Motion. We shall be asking the court for a date to regularise our processes,”
she said.
Following the submission of the counsel, Justice Adesanya while adjourning the case, ordered the parties to maintain our quo. “This case is adjourned till November 20 at the instance of both counsel for hearing,” the judge said. The former Governor had instituted a suit against the Assembly to contest the constitutionality of the probe of the buses which were procured based on budgetary approval as part of the Bus Reform Project of the State Government designed to revolutionized public transportation. According to his statement of claim before the court, Ambode said contrary to deliberate misrepresentation of facts by the lawmakers, the procurement of the 820 buses was well captured in the 2018 Appropriation Law which was duly approved by the House. In section 1 of the Bill, the 1st Defendant (House of Assembly) authorized the total Budget for the year 2018 to N1,046,121,181,680.00, comprising the sum N347,038,938,872.00, and N699,082,242,808 as the Recurrent and Capital Expenditures respectively.
