The Abuja Division of the Federal High Court struck out two separate suits filed by former Senate President Bukola Saraki to seek court protection against the plan by the EFCC to probe him.
Justice Mohammed Umar struck out the two cases on Tuesday, following a notice of discontinuance of the suits cited in the court record and after no lawyer appeared for the parties at the resumed hearing.
The former Senate president had filed the suits following the EFCC’s decision in 2019 to probe his earnings between 2003 and 2011, when he was the Kwara State governor.
The anti-graft commission was reported to have seized some of his properties in the Ikoyi area of Lagos then.
However, on May 10, 2019, Mr Saraki filed two separate suits, marked FHC/ABJ/CS/507/2019 and FHC/ABJ/CS/508/2019, before retired Justice Taiwo Taiwo to challenge the action of the EFCC.
The ex-Senate president named the Attorney General of the Federation (AGF), the Inspector General of Police, and the State Security Service (SSS) as the first, second, and third defendants.
Others are the EFCC, the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC), and the Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB) as the fourth to sixth respondents, respectively.
Mr Taiwo, who was the presiding judge then, had ruled on an ex parte application filed along with the substantive suits.
The judge ordered the EFCC and the other five respondents in the suits to stay their investigations.
He directed the parties to maintain the status quo by suspending the probe, pending the hearing and determination of the motion on notice filed by the applicant.
The order was granted after Mr Saraki’s lawyer moved the application on May 14, 2019.
However, the EFCC later applied that the judge should recuse himself and the matter be transferred to another court.
Mr Taiwo sent back the case file to the chief judge, and the matter was reassigned to Justice Anwuli Chikere (rtd.) for adjudication.
When the matter came up on July 14, 2021, before Mr Chikere, EFCC counsel Chile Okoronkwo complained that Mr Taiwo’s order had hindered the agency “from performing its duty for about two years.”
The lawyer, who stated that Mr Saraki continued to hinge on the order of the court any time he was invited, urged the court to vacate the order.
But the suits were reassigned to Justice Inyang Ekwo following the retirement of Mr Chikere.
Mr Ekwo had, on January 25, 2023, struck out the two suits for lack of diligent prosecution.
After the suits were struck out, the former Senate president, through his lawyer, approached the court for a relisting of the cases on the cause list of the court.
And on October 28, 2024, Mr Ekwo granted Mr Saraki’s prayer to amend the suits against the respondents.
The judge granted the application after it was moved by Mr Saraki’s counsel, Tunde Afe-Babalola, SAN, and was not opposed by the defence lawyers.
The cases were recently reassigned to Mr Umar.