Akinwande Soji-Ojo
The Court of Appeal sitting in Ibadan on Thursday, adjourned hearing in an appeal filed against the selection and coronation of Odemo of Isara Remo, Ogun State, Oba Albert Mayungbe.
A co-contestant to the throne, Prince Samuel Odunsi, had dragged the monarch; Secretary, Remo North Local Government; eight chiefs; Ogun State governor; Commissioner for Local Government and Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice before the Ogun State High Court, challenging Mayungbe’s selection and coronation.
He said the monarch’s selection was in error because he was an Odi by ancestry. Odi in Isara are those whose ancestral parents did not originate from the town, though they may have mixed with indigenes, including princes and princesses for centuries.
But the Ogun State High Court sitting in Sagamu dismissed the suit in a judgement delivered on March 29, 2018.
Displeased with the decision of the court, Odunsi filed an appeal against the judgement at the Court of Appeal in Ibadan, seeking an order setting aside the lower court’s decision.
Odunsi, in his eight grounds of appeal, argued that the lower court erred in law in formulating and deciding on issues that were not implicated in parties’ pleadings on the custom and tradition of Remo land and those of Isara
He argued that the lower court erred by according credence to Mayungbe’s evidence and his witnesses at the expense of his own evidence, which he said was “incontrovertible,” being the position of the Akarigbo of Remo land.
ln a letter, Akarigbo, who is the paramount ruler of Remo land, had said it was an “unpardonable abomination” for an Odi to be crowned the Odemo of Isara, a position which he said necessitated his refusal to consent to Mayungbo’s selection.
Odunsi’s appeal also noted that the court erred by upholding a claim that one person can double as an Odi and a prince in spite of the evidence before the court.
It also said that the lower court erred by holding that Mayungbe is a member of Erinsiba/Ayoledoye ruling house.
However, the case could not be heard as scheduled on Thursday because the Ogun State Government, who is the 11th to 15th respondent in the suit, filed its brief and also applied to regularise its papers on Thursday morning.
The three-member panel of justices– Justice Yagatar Nimpar, Justice Folasade Ojo and Justice Abba Mohammed– subsequently adjourned hearing of the case to January 25, 2023.
Speaking to newsmen after the court session, Counsel to Odunsi, Adeniyi Aderogba, said there was no time to respond to Ogun State Government’s brief, because they were served few minutes before the court started sitting.
He said: “The matter actually came up on the 7th of June. On that 7th of June, we regularised our papers. Unfortunately Ogun State Government was not represented in court on that day. Ogun State Government is the 11th to 15th respondent. The matter was adjourned till today, 27th of October, but unfortunately when we were in court, we were served with the brief filed by the 11th to 15th respondent, that is the Ogun State Government, together with an application to regularise their papers. Because the court has a duty to do substantial justice between the parties, the court in its magnanimity had to accommodate them. The application was moved and granted and the court adjourned the matter to the 25th day of January for hearing of the appeal. Just to mention that as appellant’s counsel, under the rules , we have 15 days to file our reply brief in response to the Ogun State Government. We’ll certainly do that. We were not given the time because we were served few minutes before the court started sitting. So, we’ve not really been able to read the processes that Ogun State Government filed. But I assure you that before the next date, we would have filed everything, so that the hearing of the appeal and go on. We just hope that the court will sit on the 25th of January so that the appeal can go on.”
Also speaking, counsel to the first respondent, Mayungbe, and eight the chiefs, Dr Victor Odunaiya, said he came to argue the appeal, but the motion was not taken.
“It was the first application we came to argue today and the appeal was the appellant’s motion, which was dated 21st of October. But that one was not taken today again. The second application by the Ogun State Government, that one was filed today and was heard today. I won’t say more,” Odunaiya said.
