The hearing in the case was adjourned yesterday for the third time due to the inability of the attorney general’s office to produce copies of the letters written by the Federal Government to the International Police(INTERPOLs).

The suit instituted by Mohammed, son of the late General Sani Abacha, and 18 other companies challenging the Federal Government’s freezing of the accounts of the Abachas, suffered yet another set-back yesterday as the office of the Attorney General failed to produce papers relevant to the suit.

The hearing in the case was adjourned yesterday for the third time due to the inability of the attorney general’s office to produce copies of the letters written by the Federal Government to the International Police (INTERPOLs), in Switzerland, Luxembourg, Liechtenstein, the United Kingdom and the State of Jersey in the United States.

Another dimension to the case was added when the AG’s chamber represented by Faanee Bebu yesterday filed a ‘motion on notice’ praying the court to grant:

An order extending the time within which the defendants/applicants (AG and FG) can apply to the court to discharge the ex-parte orders granting leave to the plaintiffs/respondents to serve the interlocutory injunction in the matter on the various foreign jurisdictions listed and;

An order discharging the ex-parte order granting leave to the plaintiffs/respondents to serve the interlocutory injunction in this matter on the various foreign jurisdictions.

The application by FG was based on the ground that the foreign jurisdictions were public authorities of their respective countries and would not be subject to any control or direction of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. They added that the plaintiffs had misrepresented to the court that the various foreign jurisdictions were agents of FG.

In an affidavit sworn to by Mr. Emeka Agbu, a litigation clerk in the Federal Ministry of Justice, the AG’s representative averred that an ex-parte order was granted sometime on January 25, 2002 allowing the plaintiffs to serve an interlocutory injunction (earlier granted by the court) on the various foreign jurisdictions.

The AG said: “there were strong press indications that the Abacha family was negotiating with FG over the release of part of the looted funds stashed away in private foreign bank accounts of the Abacha’s. As such, the purported negotiation with the family is so rife that the AG opined that the present suit might soon be withdrawn.”

Julcit Sanda, This Day (Lagos), August 1, 2002