$5.5m judgment: Appeal Court Dismisses General Electric’s Appeal

The Court of Appeal in Port Harcourt yesterday struck out the appeal filed by a United States multinational corporation with a strong presence in Nigeria, the General Electric (GE), against the $5.5million awarded against it for breach of contract by the Rivers State High Court.In Suit No RV/397/2010 filed at the Rivers State High Court in May 2010, an oil servicing company, Q Oil & Gas Services Limited, had alleged breach of contract by GE arising from the recruitment of some expatriate staff. But Justice R. Ahiakwo had in his judgment delivered on September 29, 2010, found the GE liable and directed the oil firm to pay $5.520,000 damages to the plaintiff.

Aggrieved by verdict of the Port Harcourt High Court, the GE headed for the Court of Appeal where it urged the appellate court to vacate the decision of the lower court and set it aside.

But the application for stay of execution of the judgment pending appeal was granted on the condition that a bank guarantee for the judgment debt be deposited with the High Court by the GE. The Court of Appeal, however, threw out the three applications subsequently filed by GE for variation of the order of conditional stay.

At the resumed hearing of the matter yesterday before the Court of Appeal s in Port Harcourt, the GE applied through its lawyer , Mr Tunde Olowu, to regularise the defective substantive appeal filed at the registry of the High Court by paying additional fees.

That move was strongly opposed by the lawyer to the Q Oil & Gas Services Limited, Mr Femi Falana, who contended that the Notice of appeal was materially defective and could not be cured by a court order. The Senior Advocate also argued that since there was no provision for instalment payment of filing fees, the appellate court should strike out the appeal.

In a short ruling read by a Justice of the Court of Appeal, Justice M.L Tsamiya, the appellate court upheld the submissions of Falana, and dismissed the motion for payment of additional filing fees by GE. Consequently, the substantive appeal filed by the multinational company against the judgment debt of $5.5 million was struck out.

In November 2012, GE had asked a US Court in Detroit, Michigan, not to recognise the Nigerian money judgment on the grounds of alleged corruption and lack of due process in Nigeria.

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