Rivers State High Court has granted the National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP Prince Uche Secondus, leave to issue a writ of summons to Lai Mohammad and the Federal Government.
The River State Chief Judge, Justice A. I . Iyayi-Lamikanra who presided over also granted that the defendants be served by substituted means all the originating processes together with accompanying processes in Thisday newspaper.
The case was adjourned to Monday April 23, 2018
The PDP National Chairman had dragged the Minister of Information and Culture, Alhaji Lai Mohammed, to court for defamation of character.
The minister had mentioned Prince Secondus in the list of those he claimed looted the nation’s treasury alleging that he collected N200m from the former National Security Adviser, NSA, Sambo Dasuki.
However, an embarrassed Secondus who said he never collected a dime from the former NSA, through his lawyer, Emeka Etiaba, SAN, wrote to the minister seeking the immediate retraction of the national chairman’s name on the list, payment of N1.5b damages and public apology within 48 hours.
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The letter told Alhaji Mohammad to note that if he failed to meet their demand after 48 hours, “We shall within 72 hours from today, proceed to a court of competent jurisdiction to ventilate our clients right under the law and shall further seek the protection of the court against you.”
Having failed to meet the demand, Prince Secondus, on Friday April 6, 2018, made good his threat and filed a suit at the Port Harcourt, High Court, Rivers State, claiming among other things that the court awarded to him the sum of N1.5b being damages for humiliation, castigation, vilification attack on his person and integrity as a result of the publication.
According to a statement from the PDP National Chairman’s media office signed by his spokesperson, Ike Abonyi, Secondus in the suit no/PHC/1013/2018 is also claiming that Lai Mohammad’s publication is defamatory and is asking the court to direct him to retract the said publication and apologise in writing.
He is also demanding the minister to publish the retraction and apology in all the social media including but not limited to The Nation, Thisday, The Sun, Guardian and Punch as well as in the following television channels, NTA and Channels Televisions among others where the defammatory story was published.
Secondus is also asking the court for a perpetual injunction restraining the defendant from further publishing defamatory materials against him.
Joined in the suit are the Federal Government of Nigeria through the Attorney General of the Federation and the Vintage Press Limited, publishers of The Nation newspapers.
