Former Attorney-General of the Federation under President Goodluck Jonathan, Mohammed Bello Adoke, has recorded yet another courtroom victory as a Federal Capital Territory High Court threw out a N100 million libel suit linked to the controversial OPL 245 oil deal.
The suit was filed by Olanrewaju Suraju, chairman of the HEDA Resource Centre, who accused Adoke of defaming him through a petition written to the Inspector General of Police in February 2021. In the petition, Adoke had alleged that an email was forged and a telephone conversation stage-managed in an attempt to implicate him in the OPL 245 criminal trial in Italy and related civil proceedings in the United Kingdom.
Delivering judgment, Justice Babangida Hassan dismissed the action in its entirety, ruling that Suraju failed to establish the essential ingredients of defamation. The court held that the petition, which Suraju himself tendered as evidence, did not contain his name and therefore could not be defamatory toward him.
The judge further ruled that there was no proof the certified true copy of the petition was read by any third party, a critical requirement in libel cases. Without evidence of publication, the claim could not stand. The court also rejected a Premium Times webpage presented as proof, noting it did not contain an acknowledgement copy of the petition and could not establish publication by Adoke.
In a significant pronouncement, the court affirmed that writing a petition to the police is a citizen’s right and does not in itself amount to defamation. Adoke had not filed a defence during proceedings, maintaining that no case had been established against him. The judge agreed, declaring there was “nothing to defend.”
The ruling adds to Adoke’s growing list of legal triumphs stemming from the long-running OPL 245 saga. Although his name featured prominently in proceedings in Italy and the UK, he was not a party to those trials. Nigeria ultimately lost the cases abroad, with courts ruling there was no evidence the country had been short-changed in the oil block transaction.
Adoke has consistently denied any wrongdoing, insisting that materials used to implicate him, including an email and a purported phone interview, were fabricated. He petitioned the police to investigate the alleged forgeries, after which Suraju was indicted and recommended for prosecution over alleged cybercrime. That criminal case was later terminated in April 2022 on the orders of then-AGF Abubakar Malami due to overlapping civil proceedings in the UK.
The former AGF has also secured victories in cases filed against him in Nigeria by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC). In a dramatic development abroad, two Milan prosecutors, Fabio De Pasquale and Sergio Spadaro, were later jailed in Italy for forgery and withholding evidence in the OPL 245 trial.
With the latest dismissal of the libel suit, Adoke’s courtroom resurgence appears firmly intact, reinforcing a narrative of steady legal vindication in the protracted OPL 245 controversy.
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