Court Strikes out Suit Seeking Inclusion of S/East in National Lottery Board

Wale Igbintade

A Federal High Court in Abuja has struck out a suit seeking an order compelling President Muhammadu Buhari to appoint a member from the South-east geopolitical zone to the governing board of the National Lottery Commission.

Justice Taiwo Taiwo held that the plaintiff, Mr. Chidiebere Nwachukwu, commenced the suit via a defective originating summons.

The plaintiff had in a suit marked FHC/ABJ/CS/518/2021, which was filed by his counsel, Oloruntoba Elisha, argued that the governing board of the National Lottery Commission had two members each from the North-central and the South-west geopolitical zones, leaving out the South-eastern geopolitical zone.

He prayed the court for an order to dissolve the composition/constitution of the National Lottery Commission’s governing board by the president for being “in gross violation of Sections 2(2) (C) of the National Lottery Act, 2005, and Section 14 (3) of the 1999 Constitution of Nigeria (as amended).

The plaintiff further prayed for an order directing the president (first defendant) to reconstitute the governing board of the National Lottery Commission (third defendant) “and appoint a member from the South-east geopolitical zone in line with the combined provisions of Sections 2(2) (C) of the National Lottery Act, 2005 and Section 14 (3) of the 1999 Constitution of Nigeria (As Amended).”

However, the first to third defendants represented by Feyisara Titiloye for first and second defendants, and Obumselu Ifunanya for the third defendant in their Notice of Preliminary Objection (NPO) dated August 27, 2021, urged the court to dismiss the suit.

The defendants argued among others that the plaintiff lacked the locus standi to institute the matter.

They contended that the plaintiffs’ originating summons was incompetent, and was never issued by a Judge or the Registrar of the court as required by the rules of the court.

The defendants also added that the action was statute barred, and the court had no jurisdiction to hear the matter.

Delivering judgment on February 22, 2022, Justice Taiwo upheld the defendants’ Notice of Preliminary Objection.

He held that: “The originating process before me is not sealed and therefore cannot be said to have been issued.

“In the light of this, other grounds of objection and indeed the substantive matter which I have identified, most unfortunately, cannot be decided any longer by this court in view of my finding that the originating summons was not sealed, and therefore incompetent and incurably bad.

‘’I cannot decide any issue on a defective originating summons. I cannot be sentimental as being urged by the plaintiff’s counsel. Sentiments have no place in law. One cannot put something on nothing and expect it to stand. It will be pointless to proceed beyond this point. This is the end of the road for this suit as presently constituted.

“The jurisdiction of the court does not extend to administering medicine to a cadaver. However, the law does not permit me to dismiss this suit, and as such, I will do what the law permits and it is to strike out this matter for the reasons stated above. This suit is accordingly struck out. This is the judgement of the court.”