The Supreme Court, on Tuesday, imposed a fine of N40 million on human rights activists and constitutional lawyer, Mike Ozekhome, for filing a “frivolous” motion before the court regarding the Imo State governorship tussle, which was decided in 2019.
In a ruling by Justice Tijani Abubakar, the court ordered the senior lawyer to pay the N40 million fines to the four respondents he had sued.
Justice Abubakar held in the ruling that the request was strange, frivolous, baseless, unwarranted, vexatious and irritating.
He further held that the motion was a calculated design to demonise the Supreme Court.
The fine was for bringing a motion before the Supreme Court, seeking to re-validate the suit that removed Emeka Ihedioha as governor of Imo State in 2019.
Those to be paid are the Action Peoples Party, Uche Nnadi, Uche Nwosu and the Independent National Electoral Commission.
In the motion, Ozekhome had asked the court for a consequential order to compel INEC to issue a fresh Certificate of Return to Mr Ihedioha to enable him to spend four-year tenure as the Imo State governor.
His grouse was that the incumbent governor, Hope Uzodimma “unlawfully” spent the four years which Ihedioha ought to spend.
Among others, Ozekhome in the motion claimed that the All Progressives Congress had no candidate in the 2019 Imo governorship election, hence, Uzodimma ought not to have been made a governor on the platform of the APC.
The Supreme Court, however, dismissed the motion on the grounds that it had no jurisdiction to entertain it.
Ozekhome, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, was called to the Nigerian Bar over 42 years ago.
