Justice Inyang Edem Ekwo of the Federal High Court in Abuja has struck out a suit put forward by a Coalition of Northern Groups looking for the exit of Igbos in the South East out of Nigeria.
The lawsuit by the group of elders and politicians from the North, escorted by Nastura Shariff, Balarabe Rufa’i, Abdul-Aziz Sulaiman and Aminu Adam was rejected by the Judge after the persistent absence of the plaintiffs in court to establish their case.
When the matter came up, none of the plaintiffs had been in court and they were not represented by lawyers.
Justice Ekwo, after going through the case file, found out that the Northern groups had not been attending to court since 2022 till present and had no legal representation.
In a short ruling, the Judge held that from all signs, the plaintiffs have thrown out their own suit.
Justice Ekwo therefore, rejected the case for lacking diligent prosecution.
The Northern group had filed the case asking the court to compel the Senate President and Speaker of the House of Representatives to quicken the exit of the southeastern region out of Nigeria.
They had begged for this to be done before the conclusion of the amendment of Nigeria’s 1999 Constitution.
The secession request by the Northern elders was contained in the suit marked FHC/ABJ/CS/538/2021.
In the suit, they claimed that allowing the Igbo tribe to exit Nigeria would end violence and destruction in the South-East.
They also explained that this would stop the reoccurrence of the 1967-1970 Civil War in Nigeria that led to deliberate destruction of lives and property.
The groups also said this would put an end to the agitations by members of the Indigenous People of Biafra, IPOB, led by Nnamdi Kanu.
