How Court Of Appeal Restored Daily Times Ownership To Folio, Anosike Brothers

The position of Anosike brothers and their company, Folio Communications, as the authentic owners of Daily Times of Nigeria has been further strengthened by the ruling of the Court of Appeal in Lagos which recently ruled that an earlier judgment by a Federal High Court to the contrary was entirely null, void and therefore of no effect.

In a certified true copy of the judgement of the Court of Appeal made available to LEADERSHIP yesterday, Justice Amina Adamu-Augie , leading two other Justices in a unanimous decision berated Okechukwu Okeke of the Ikoyi Federal High Court who in 2010 gave judgement in favour of one Ikechukwu Obiora on the ownership of Daily Times.

Before arriving at their decision, the Court of Appeal Justices recalled an out- of–court settlement between the Anosikes and Ikechukwu Obiora the terms of which stated that “No party shall file any new action based on the matters, the subject of this settlement agreement under any guise whatsoever save for the enforcement of this agreement.”

Their Lordship therefore frowned at the lower court’s refusal to attend to the objection raised by Anosikes on grounds that Ikechukwu Obiora being a signatory to the terms of the out- of- court settlement does not have the locus standi to bring the matter to the court.

“It is trite law that a Court without jurisdiction automatically lacks the competence to try the case in the first place.- see Utih V. Onayivwe (1991) 1 NWLR (pg. 166) 166 SC ---Obviously, the lower court fell into a serious error when it failed or refused to consider the prayer for leave to raise the issue of locus standi, which means that the said issue is still hanging, and nothing can be done until it is resolved.

“In the circumstances of this case, I really think that the lower court should have adjourned the matter or taken its time to consider the application because the issue of locus standi is not something a Court can ignore or close its eyes to since it may affect jurisdiction, and jurisdiction is the lifeline of any action,” their Lordships said.

Based on the above, the three Court of Appeal justices: Justice Amina Adamu Augie, Justice Rita Nosakhare and Justice Fatima O. Akinbami unanimously set aside the Federal High Court ruling.

”This Appeal therefore succeeds and is allowed,” their Lordships declared.

In addition, the Court of Appeal justices ruled that the case file be sent back to the Federal High Court Lagos ordering that a new judge be assigned to start the case de-novo (from the beginning).

They also ruled that the new judge to be appointed on the matter should first of all determine whether or not the petitioner disclosed a cause of action bearing in mind the out- of-court settlement “since the issue of ‘locus standi’ and ‘cause of action’ are jurisdictional issues.”



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