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The Court of Appeal sitting in Ibadan on Monday, adjourned the suit filed by the Oyo State Government against the May 6, 2019 judgement of the State High Court, restraining the government from dissolving elected council chairmen till April 1, 2020, for hearing.
The adjournment followed the withdrawal and striking out of three applications earlier filed by lead counsel to Association of Local Government of Nigeria(ALGON), Chief Adeniyi Akintola (SAN), which would have stalled the hearing of the substantive suit before the panel headed by Justice Jimi Bada.
At the resumed hearing of the matter, Akintola had informed the court that he had an application dated and filed on October 16, 2019 seeking an extension of time with which to file his clients’ brief of argument. The court allowed him to move the application and it was so moved and court granted his prayers.
He further prayed the panel to accelerate hearing in the matter, informing the court that he had two other applications dated December 27, 2019 and filed on December 30, 2019 bordering on injunction seeking to set aside the acts of the appellants by going ahead to take action on the substantive matter, adding that “they knew of the pendency of this application and they still went ahead to constitute Caretaker Committee.”
The other application, he said, was a Motion on Notice for injunction, dated August 5, 2019 and filed on August 6, 2019.
The panel had expressed the opinion that if Akintola wanted the substantive application to be heard as quick as possible, he has to do something about his applications that the will serve as obstacles to the hearing of the substantive suit.
Akintola agreed to take a date for hearing of the substantive matter while the other applications are kept in the file in abeyance.
The Court further observed that it was better for Akintola to remove all the obstacles because the applications sought to be kept in abeyance or in the file could eventually affect the main matter.
Counsel to the government, Kunle Kalejaiye (SAN) had informed the court that he was surprised that his learned friend went ahead to tell the court that he still wanted to move an application while keeping some since they met before the sitting and agreed that there would be no mischief.
In its ruling, the three-man panel held that since the two applications had been withdrawn by Akintola, they were consequently struck out and adjourned the matter till April 1, 2020.