By Jerry Uwah
Lagos
A Federal High Court in Lagos would on March 25, 2015, give its ruling on the preliminary objection filed by the Founder of Living Faith Church, a.k.a. Winners’ Chapel, Mr. David Oyedepo, against a suit accusing him of breach of contract.
The suit was instituted by a stock brokerage firm, Valueline Securities and Investment Limited and its Managing Director, Samuel Enyinnaya.
The plaintiffs are seeking, among others, monetary claims in the sum of about N1.86 billion from Oyedepo, his family, his book publishing company and the Winners’ Chapel for allegedly breaching agreement on a N9bn investment entrusted to the plaintiffs.
Also sued along with Oyedepo is the Nigerian Stock Exchange, which the plaintiff accused of being biased in its investigations into the N9 billion business dispute.
The plaintiffs asked the court to declare as illegal the freezing of their bank accounts by NSE and to make an order to immediately unfreeze their accounts.
At the resumed hearing into the case on Monday, counsel for Oyedepo, Mr. Chioma Okwuanyi, brought to the court’s notice his client’s preliminary objection to the stockbroker’s claims.
In the three grounds of objection, Okwuanyi contended that the Federal High Court lacked jurisdiction to adjudicate on a matter pertaining to capital market.
Okwuanyi further submitted that if it was true as the plaintiffs had claimed that the matter was “a simple contract” bordering on investment portfolio management, the state High Court and not the Federal High Court had jurisdiction on the case.
Counsel for the Nigerian Stock Exchange, Mr. M.O. Liadi, argued that the plaintiffs ought to have approached the NSE Council to ventilate their grievances rather than coming before the Federal High Court.
But the plaintiffs’ lawyer, Mr. Rickey Tarfa (SAN), urged the court to assume jurisdiction and to dismiss the defendants’ preliminary objection for being irregular and for failing to comply with the rules of the court.
After entertaining submissions from all parties, Yunusa fixed March 25, this year, for ruling on the preliminary objections.