BEVERLY HILLS, December 10, (THEWILL) – Former President Olusegun Obasanjo has been given a 21-day ultimatum to show why he should not be punished for flouting the order of a court.
An Abuja High Court sitting in Wuse Zone 2 handed down the ultimatum to the former President on Wednesday.
The order was sequel to Tuesday’s launch of Obasanjo’s controversial autobiography, My Watch, which the court had restrained him from publishing.
Presiding judge of the court, Justice Valentine Ashi, who issued the ultimatum, also ordered the police, Department of State Service (DSS) and the Customs to confiscate copies of the book just as he restrained the former president from further publication and circulation of the book pending the determination of a substantive suit on the matter before the court.
Obasanjo had defied the ex-parte interim order made by the court on December 5 and a pending libel suit before the court involving him as he launched the autobiography at a well-publicised ceremony in Lagos on Tuesday.
Obasanjo went ahead with the presentation of the book allegedly arguing that the book had been published before the court was misled into making the orders.
But when the matter came up for hearing on Wednesday, the judge took arguments from lawyer to the plaintiff/applicant, Alex Iziyon, (SAN) and defendant/respondent’s lawyer, Realwon Okpanachi, on the plaintiff’s motion for interlocutory injunctions, the defendant’s counter affidavit and motion for order to vacate the earlier granted interim orders.
In his ruling , Justice Ashi maintained that it was wrong for Obasanjo to have proceeded to publish the book despite the fact that a libel suit, which subject matter formed part of the content of the book, was still pending before the court and that the orders he made on December 5 was still pending.
The judge further held that it was immaterial that the book was published before the interim orders were made, saying the former president ought not to have published the book because he was aware of the part-heard libel suit relating to the letter he wrote to President Goodluck Jonathan, accusing a chieftain of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Buruji Kashamu, of being a fugitive that is wanted in the United States.
According to the judge, “The fact that the book was published in November is irrelevant. As long as the substantive suit is not yet determined, no party is entitled to publish or comment on material facts that are yet to be decided on by the court.
“I hold the defendant, not only in contempt of the court, but to show cause why he should not be punished for contempt and ordered to undo what he has wrongly done.
“The defendant, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, shall be given 21 days, from the day this order is served on him, to show cause, via affidavit, why he should not be punished for contempt committed by publishing and distributing for sale to the public, the book, My Watch, in plain disregard of the pendency of substantive the suit and the order of this court made on December 5, 2014 restraining him from doing so.
“The defendants, whether by himself, agents, servants, privies or whatever name called, is hereby restrained from further publication or offering for sale or distribution, in any way or manner, the book called My Watch, or the like of the visual or written materials which contains a re-publication or statement extracted from the letter referred to by the plaintiff.”
Maintaining that the enrolled orders of the court be served on all media houses in the country and be equally served on the defendant by publication in two national dailies, the judge rejected argument by the defendants that the interim orders were wrongly made as the plaintiff failed to produce the book to show that it actually contained the alleged libelous materials.
According to the judge, since the plaintiff said he came to court on the fear that Obasanjo was to publish a book that touched on the issue already before the court, it was the duty of the defendant, in whose custody the material was, to show the court that the plaintiff’s fear was misplaced.
“What I find difficult to understand is why the defendants went through the pains to depose to the ISBN number and other details about the book, which they said was published since November before the interim order was obtained on December 5, without supplying the court with copies of the book.
“This would have served to disprove the claim by the applicant/plaintiff that the book contains a reproduction of the letter, which formed the subject of the libel case before the court.
“The fact that the book was published in November, while the substantive case was still pending is contemptuous enough.”
The judge argued that Obasanjo’s refusal to supply the court the book to convince the court that nothing relating to the subject of the pending libel case was contained in the book suggested that Obasanjo was hiding something.
Justice Ashi therefore offered to grant the substantive suit expeditiously hearing as he adjourned further hearing on the matter to January 13, 2015.
The plaintiff, Kashamu, had on February 6 dragged Obasanjo before the court, accusing him of defaming him (Kashamu) in the former President’s December 2, 2013 letter to President Goodluck Jonathan titled: “Before it is too late.”
The hearing in the case had reached an advance stage and was adjourned for Obasanjo to open his defence. But before he could open his defence, Kashamu told the court on December 5 that Obasanjo was planning to publish a book with the December 2, 2013 letter forming part of the content.
He therefore sought an interim order restraining Obasanjo, which the court granted and fixed December 10 for the hearing of the another motion by Kashamu for interlocutory orders.
However, rather than appeal the interim orders, Obasanjo went ahead to publicly present the book on December 9 in Lagos.
In his reaction to the ruling, counsel to Obasanjo , Okpanachi, said the former president will appeal , stressing that the orders, which his client allegedly flouted were made in error because the plaintiff failed to show, through material facts, that the letter formed the content of the book.
According to Okpanachi, “The orders made cannot be enforced. They want the court to stop an act that had been concluded. That is impossible. We had published the book in November, they came before the court in December and asked that the publishing should be stopped. Is that possible?
“We shall file our appeal within the stipulated time of 14 days in the case of interlocutory orders.”
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