Abuja (Nigeria): The Osun State Government on Friday filed a notice of withdrawal of the suit it instituted against the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) and the Accountant-General of the Federation (AGF) at the Federal High Court in Abuja.
Counsel to the state’s government, Musibau Adetumbi, SAN, told Justice Emeka Nwite that events had overtaken the case.
Adetunbi said that the suit, which sought to safeguard the withheld local government funds, had been defeated as the allocation had been moved out of the CBN by the defendants.
The Osun Attorney General (AG) had, on the state government’s behalf, sued the CBN, and AGF in the case.
Judge Nwite, however, dropped the name of the Attorney-General of the Federation from the suit on Sept. 22, after the plaintiff discontinued the case against him, as a similar suit was already before the Supreme Court.
The suit seeks to stop the Federal Government from releasing withheld local government allocations to sacked chairmen and councillors elected during former Gov. Adegboyega Oyetola’s tenure.
“On Sept. 29, 2025, when the matter was heard, I told the court that our primary aim was to safeguard the money.
“Between then and now, we are sure that, notwithstanding the pendency of the case and order of status quo, the money was moved out of the CBN,” Adetumbi said.
He told the court that the notice of discontinuance was filed pursuant to Order 51 Rule 2 of the Federal High Court Rules.
He said that any further arguments in the matter would amount to an academic exercise.
CBN’s lawyer, Muritala Abdulrasheed, SAN, and that of the AGF, Tajudeen Oladoja, SAN, did not oppose the application for discontinuance of the suit.
They, however, disagreed with the averments in an affidavit of facts attached to the application.
According to Muritala, the plaintiff made damaging depositions in the affidavit of facts.
He said that the plaintiff should withdraw the affidavit along with the notice of discontinuance because some of the depositions in the affidavit were against persons who were not parties in the matter.
“Somebody can approach the court any day with a request for a Certified True Copy (CTC) of the process and may decide to use it against the persons mentioned in the plaintiff’s affidavit of facts,” the CBN lawyer stated.
He argued that the grounds upon which the notice of discontinuance was predicated were in bad faith.
He said the plaintiff got it wrong when he claimed that the 1st defendant had no competent response to the plaintiff’s originating summons.
Besides, he said that a 12-paragraph counter-affidavit to the originating summons was filed on behalf of his client in May.
He urged the court to expunge paragraphs 5 to 11 in the affidavit of facts filed by the plaintiff for being inaccurate and for referring to persons who are not before the court.
AGF’s counsel, Oladoja, on his part, did not oppose the application for discontinuance.
He said the plaintiff had the liberty to withdraw his case.
“However, we are in vehement opposition to the 2nd ground upon which the application is predicated.
“The plaintiff is not under any obligation to predicate his application on any ground,” he said.
He equally argued that the plaintiff was wrong to have said that the 2nd defendant had no competent defence in the matter.
He urged the court to strike out ground one of the notice of discontinuance and ground two, which stated that certain money had been paid.
The lawyer said the 2nd defendant had not been allowed to react to the claim.
Oladoja also requested a cost of N10 million against the plaintiff for bringing the 2nd defendant to court, for the court processes filed in the matter, and for wasting the court’s precious judicial time.
Responding, Adetumbi said a notice of discontinuance under Order 50 Rule 2 of the FHC Rules does not attract cost.
He added that the defendants had not filed any process before the court.
“It is their default to have filed their process out of time.
“They cannot approach the court to ask for costs or expunge any of the grounds in the notice of discontinuance.”
The plaintiff’s counsel said the defendants were not entitled to costs because of their own default.
Justice Nwite adjourned the matter until Oct. 29 for ruling on the plaintiff’s application for discontinuance and other applications by the defendants.
The judge, in a ruling on Thursday, dismissed the objection raised by CBN and AGF against the suit.
The judge held that the state’s AG had locus standi (legal right) to file the suit on behalf of the local government authorities.
