MR. Charles Okechukwu & Anor V. Economic And Financial Crimes Commission (Efcc) & Ors (2014)

LawGlobal-Hub Lead Judgment Report – COURT OF APPEAL

CHINWE EUGENIA IYIZOBA, J.C.A. (Delivering the Leading Judgment)

This is an appeal against the Ruling of Shakarho J. of the Federal High sitting in Lagos in Suit No. FHC/L/CS/727/2007 delivered on the 18th day of March 2010 striking out the Appellants’ application for enforcement of their Fundamental rights.

The Applicants (now Appellants) with leave of the Trial Court brought an application pursuant to Order 2 Rules 1, 3 and 4 of the Fundamental Rights (Enforcement Procedure) Rules, 1979, claiming the following reliefs against the Respondents:-

i. A Declaratory Order that the arrests and detention of the 1st Appellant at the 1st Respondent’s office at 15(a) Awolowo Road, Ikoyi on the 12th, 13th and 17th of July,2007 on a mere allegation that the Applicants were owing the 2nd and 3rd Respondents the sum of US$162,000.00 is illegal, unlawful and unconstitutional.

ii. A Declaratory Order that the 1st Respondent is not a debt collector and is not empowered by the Act that established it to recover moneys for individuals and organizations whether within or outside Nigeria.

iii. A Perpetual Order of Injunction restraining the Respondents either by themselves, their agents, privies, servants or howsoever called from further arresting, detaining or infringing on the Applicants’ right to liberty as enshrined and ensconced in the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999.

iv. A Mandatory Order that the Applicants be paid the sums of US$133,000.00 by the Respondents jointly and severally being the money received by the Respondents from the Applicants for a consideration that has failed and was frustrated and US$150,000.00 being compensation for the damages suffered by the 1st Applicant as a result of the violation of his Constitutional rights by the Respondents as aforesaid and also for the humiliation and embarrassment suffered by the 1st Applicant in the hands of the Respondents, their agents and servants.

v. The Applicants demand a Public Apology to be published in a National Daily by the Respondents for the 1st Applicant’s unconstitutional arrests and detentions which have caused him a great embarrassment and untold hardship.

vi. AND for such further or other orders as the Honourable Court may deem fit to make in the circumstances.

The Appellants’ Motion on Notice was filed on the 8th of August 2007. In support of their Motion on Notice the Appellants filed a 44 paragraph Affidavit deposed to by the 1st Appellant. In the said Affidavit, the 1st Appellant deposed that sometime in the year 2003, the 2nd Appellant and the 2nd and 3rd Respondents commenced the business of importation of shoes with the 2nd and 3rd Respondents shipping shoes from the Peoples’ Republic of China to the 2nd Appellant in Nigeria.

Sometime in 2006, the 2nd and 3rd Respondents shipped three 40 feet Containers of shoes to Cotonou port in the Republic of Benin to the Appellants. The containers were seized and auctioned by the Customs Authority in Cotonou because according to the 1st Appellant, the 2nd and 3rd Respondents did not release the Bill of Laden to the said goods. The 2nd and 3rd Respondents thereafter engaged the services of the 1st Respondent to collect the alleged sum being the cost of the imported shoes from the Appellants.

The 1st Appellant averred that the 1st Respondent arrested and detained him on three different occasions whereupon the 1st Respondent extracted an undertaking from him to repay the alleged sum of US$162,000.00 and that he was consequently made to pay a total sum of $5,000 to the 2nd and 3rd Respondents through the 1st Respondent.

The 1st Respondent filed its Counter Affidavit averring that it carried out its statutory duties by inviting the 1st Appellant to offer an explanation in respect of a petition allegedly written by the 2nd and 3rd Respondents.

The 2nd and 3rd Respondents also filed their Counter Affidavit in which they averred that they wrote a petition to the 1st Respondent alleging that the Appellants defrauded them to the tune of $162,000.000. It was on the basis of the said petition that the 1st Respondent arrested the 1st Appellant. The Appellants in turn filed their Replies to the Counter Affidavits of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd Respondents.