Libel suit: The Sun lawyer opposes move by Gov Orji’s son to inject fresh facts

LATEST UPDATE: Libel suit: The Sun lawyer opposes move by Gov Orji’s son to inject fresh facts

An Abia State High court sitting in Ohafia has re­served ruling till January 26th on two applications brought by the defense counsel seek­ing an order striking out portions of the claimants counter affidavit and an­other striking out the name of the 2nd defendant from the suit.

The defense counsel in the libel suit between The Sun Publishing Ltd and son of Abia State governor, Chinedu Orji, yesterday urged the Court to strike out some portions of the claimants’ reply to defen­dant’s statement of defense for raising new facts which were never raised nor ad­mitted in the statement of defense.

In the application, Chief Charles Enwelunta sub­mitted that it was not per­missible under the rules of pleading for claimant in his reply to raise new facts which were neither contained nor admitted in defendant’s statement of defense.

Enwelunta further noted that a claimant could not be a counter claimant in the same suit.

“They are claiming that we have apologized but the Court should restrict itself to our statement of defense” he urged.

The defense counsel is also, in a separate appli­cation urged the court to strike out the names of the second defendant/applicant (Ebere Wabara) and all claims and reliefs against him in the suit as the court lacked the adjudicative ju­risdiction to hear and deter­mine the request for lack of service of the originating processes on 2nd defendant at all or in any manner per­missible by law.

He submitted that the court lacked the adjudica­tive jurisdiction to hear, entertain and determine the instant suit as it affects the 2nd defendant in the suit when he has not been served with the originating processes as permitted by law and in the manner or­dered by the court on 26th of March 2014.

In his reply to the appli­cation, the claimants coun­sel Levi Uzoukwu (SAN) noted that he had filed a counter affidavit urging the court to dismiss the appli­cation.

He also noted that it was elementary law that a party and the court were bound by reliefs sought thereof. “There are two reliefs sought by the applicant, none is asking for striking out, and this court cannot. If it succeeds only three paragraphs can be struck out.”

There was however, a mild drama in court when the defense counsel ve­hemently objected to the permission granted the Claimant’s counsel to give further reply after the de­fense had given its reply on points of law.





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