Admin l Wednesday, December 02, 2020
IKOYI, Lagos, Nigeria – A Federal High Court sitting in Ikoyi, Lagos has adjourned till January 12, 2021 to rule on an application by businessman, Jimoh Ibrahim, seeking the reversal of an interim court order which authorised the Asset Management Corporation of Nigeria to take over his properties over alleged N69.4bn.
Justice Rilwan Aikawa fixed the date on Tuesday after taking arguments from counsel for AMCON Mr Kemi Pinheiro SAN, as well as lawyer to Nicon Investment Limited and Global Fleet Oil and Gas Limited, Adenrele Adegborioye.
In moving his counter affidavit Pinheiro told Justice Rilwan Aikawa that his counter affidavit filed in opposition to the motion to discharge the experte order revealed copious reasons why the order should not be set aside. Pinheiro said that the various exhibit attached to the counter affidavit established that the properties attached belongs to the defendant, therefore cannot say he knows nothing about them.
Ibrahim and his firms prayed the court to order AMCON to pay them N50bn indemnity for their alleged “failure to conduct due diligence before obtaining the said order sought to be set aside and for misrepresentation and concealment of fact.”
But AMCON’s lawyer, Pinheiro, opposed the defendants’ Motion on Notice and prayed the court to dismiss same. A lawyer in AMCON’s legal department, Imelda Raheem, said, “The plaintiff, at the time of obtaining the orders on the 4th day of November, 2020, made full and substantial disclosure of all material facts in relation to the subject matter of this suit.”
Following the seizure order made by Justice Rilwan Aikawa on November 4, AMCON took over 12 properties belonging to Ibrahim and his firms.
The properties included the NICON Investment Limited building Plot 242, Muhammadu Buhari Way, Central Business District, Abuja; NICON Hotels Limited building at Plot 557, Port-Harcourt Crescent, off Gimbiya Street, Abuja and the building of NICON Lekki Limited also at No. 5, Customs Street, Lagos.
