SAN FRANCISCO, July 04, (THEWILL) – The Senate has declared that it had been vindicated by the ruling of the Justice Gabriel Kolawole-led Federal High Court in Abuja which described the forgery of Senate Rules suit as an abuse of court process and a decision taken against public interest.
In a statement issued on Sunday by its spokesman, Senator Aliyu Sabi Abdullahi, the Senate accused the Minister of Justice and Attorney-General of Federation, Mr. Abubakar Mallami of acting a partisan script in the suit.
The Senate President, Bukola Saraki, his Deputy, Ike Ekweremadu, the outgoing Clerk to the National Assembly, Alhaji Salisu Maikasuwa and Deputy Clerk, Mr. Ben Efeturi, are being prosecuted in the suit filed at a Federal Capital Territory High Court.
Abdullahi urged Malami to address the issue of his personal and pecuniary interest in the case as he was a counsel to the aggrieved senators who decided to externalise the issue of election of the Senate leadership after they failed in their bid to get their preferred candidate elected to lead the Upper Chamber.
“It has now become obvious from the ruling of Justice Kolawole and in the facts of the matter before the Federal High Court, Malami was the one who advised his clients to report the matter to the police and now that he has become AGF, he decided to use his constitutional powers to pursue private interest by filing a criminal case in the FCT High Court against the subsisting ruling of a court of co-ordinate jurisdiction,” he said.
The Senate clarified that it invited the AGF not to challenge his right to file, take over or discontinue any criminal case, but for him to explain the issues of conflict of interest, abuse of office, disrespect of a subsisting order of a court and violation of the principle of Separation of Powers which are being raised against him.
The statement concluded by “calling on all parties, Mr. Malami, the Attorney General inclusive, to heed the wise, timely and apt advice of former Vice President Atiku Abubakar that “it is time to move on”. Truly, Nigeria needs our collective energy to address the various challenges – notably increasing poverty, hunger, youth unemployment, general insecurity and kidnapping, among others – which are time bombs that we can only ignore at our own collective peril.”
