Ise-Oluwa Ige
12 January 2009
Barring any last minute change, a full panel of the Supreme Court will, this morning, commence hearing in multiple lawsuits by governments of 13 states of the Federation challenging the Federal Government over alleged illegal diversion of huge sums of monies that should have constitutionally stood to the credit of the Federation Account for onward sharing among the three tiers of government in the country.
The large chunk of the said funds under controversy totalling several trillions of naira were allegedly diverted by the Federal Government between 2004 and 2007.
According to the plaintiff states, the funds were illegally used to finance Federal Government projects like the power and railway projects; Federal ministries like the Federal Inland Revenue Services and the Nigeria Customs and to service the debts owed the Paris Clubs by the Federal Government.
In their lawsuits, the 13 states are praying the apex court for an order compelling the Federal Government to refund to them all the said monies illegally diverted between 2004 till date with interest.
For instance, Oyo government alone has summed up the total amount it was allegedly shortchanged between 2004 and 2007 by the Federal Government as N97.2 billion.
Although the Federal Government is reaching out to the states of the Federation to withdraw the suit, Vanguard's investigation at the Supreme Court last Friday revealed that there was yet to be any accord between the two tiers of government.
Indeed, the Supreme Court has fixed today for definite commencement of hearing in four of the 13 lawsuits already filed at the apex court.
It is also expected that the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Justice Idris Kutigi, would have empanelled, by now, seven justices to hear the case since hearing in the lawsuits was stalled at the last adjourned date owing to the fact that only five justices were available to take the case.
Vanguard learnt yesterday that more states of the federation are warming up to file their own action over similar matter.
The court, by its tradition, may use one of the lawsuits as a test case while the outcome in the test case will serve as verdict for all other pending similar cases.
The various writs already filed before the courts by different states of the Federation were filed by a team of seasoned legal practitioners.
For instance, the Oyo State's writ of summons was filed by a team of Chief Adegboyega Awomolo (SAN), Yusuf Ali (SAN), Dr Konyinsola Ajayi (SAN), Prof Yemi Osinbajo (SAN), Chief Chris Uche (SAN), Dr Akin Onigbinde, Prof Akinseye George and Ogunmuyiwa Balogun.
In the Oyo writ, the state government is contending that between 2004 and 2007, several monies that ought to be paid into the Federation Account were unconstitutionally diverted by the Federal Government to finance projects unknown to the constitution.
The state also said that, at times, such monies were also diverted into accounts like the Excess Crude Account, which are unknown to the constitution.
Oyo, in the suit, is contending that assuming all those monies diverted were paid into the Federation Account, it would have had an extra fair share of N97,260,000,000.00 from the Federation Account for the development of its state.
The state listed some of the said monies which were diverted to include monies accruable to the Federation Account from the signature bonus paid by bidders for oil blocks and applicants for oil prospecting licences and oil mining licences, income or returns from dividends declared and paid by the NLGN in respect of shared owned among several other sources.
Others include monies from proceeds of sale of government property, privatisation proceeds, proceeds from Education Tax, other dividends and internally generated revenue of Federal ministries, parastatals and agencies among others.
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