The Federal High Court, Abuja has granted a garnishee order absolute, on Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to release N81.9 billion to Ibeno Local Government Area of Akwa Ibom.<\/p>\n
The money is standing to the credit of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) and its joint venture partner, Mobil Producing Nigeria Unlimited.<\/p>\n
Justice Taiwo Taiwo gave the order while ruling on a garnishee nisi proceeding.<\/p>\n
Ibeno is one of the oil producing communities in Akwa Ibom.<\/p>\n
The community instituted a suit against NNPC, Mobil Producing Nigeria Unlimited and ExxonMobil Corporation seeking about N100 billion compensation for economic losses suffered from oil spillages caused by the defendants during exploration.<\/p>\n
The oil communities, led by Mr. Effiong Archianga and nine others had through their lawyer, Mr. Lucius Nwosu (SAN), sought redress over oil spillage in the area.<\/p>\n
They alleged that the spillage had caused environmental degradation in their communities.<\/p>\n
The court had in June 21, 2021, in a judgement, awarded N81.9 billion to the plaintiffs, who are now judgement creditors.<\/p>\n
The court had ordered that the money be paid within 14 days after which eight per cent interest would be accruable on the principal sum annually.<\/p>\n
However, on Dec. 15, 2021, in a garnishee nisi proceeding, the CBN insisted that it must get the consent of the Attorney-General of the Federation before enforcing the garnishee judgement.<\/p>\n
Justice Taiwo dismissed the claim of CBN and ordered it to release funds belonging to NNPC and Mobil to the tune of N89 billion to the judgement creditor.<\/p>\n
The court said it was wrong for the apex bank to say it had to get consent from the Attorney-General before attaching the judgement debt, insisting that the CBN was not a public officer.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe Jan. 6, 2022 application is hereby refused, the order nisi is made absolute against the CBN,\u201d Justice Taiwo ordered.<\/p>\n
Justice Taiwo dismissed an application challenging the service of garnishee order nisi on the judgement debtor.<\/p>\n
He said that the coming into force of the Petroleum Industry Act had altered the name of the NNPC and not its identify.<\/p>\n
He added that the CEO, directors and employees of NNPC were still the ones working for NNPC Ltd.<\/p>\n
The judge also said that NNPC Ltd inherited assets, interests and liabilities of NNPC.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt follows that the identity of the judgement debtor has been known, and the misnomer will be corrected, since it is a mistake of a name.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe judgement debtor is a juristic person, and the applicant has not suffered any injustice upon the mistake in the name of the applicant,\u201d the judge held<\/p>\n
The garnishee order is one of the options open to a judgement creditor to enforce a judgement that has been made in its favour.<\/p>\n
It is solely used to enforce monetary judgements against a debtor to recover money.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Federal High Court, Abuja has granted a garnishee order absolute, on Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) to release N81.9 billion to Ibeno Local Government Area of Akwa Ibom. The…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":69663,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-92357","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\n