Firm Sues AGF, Alleges Abuse Of Office

[TGD]

 A FIRM, Autobahn Techniques Limited, has sued the Attorney General of the Federation (AGF) and Minister of Justice Mr Mohammed Bello Adoke, SAN, before an Abuja Federal High Court presided over by Justice Gabriel Kolawole, accusing him of unlawful conduct that bordered on conflict of interest and brazen display of impunity.

In the suit filed by a Lagos lawyer, Ogbonnaya Agbafo, on behalf of the firm on Wednesday, the AGF was sued in his personal capacity as well as in his office for "acting ultra vires the statutory powers of the office of the Attorney General of the Federation."

Other defendants in the suit include the National Co-ordinator of NAPEP Dr. Magnus Kpakol, the Minister of State for Commerce. Josephine Tapgun and the Registrar of Trade Marks Jamila Ahmadu-Suka.

The suit is sequel to the recent directive by Adoke to the Registrar of Trademarks, Hajia Jamila Ahmadu-Suka to cancel the Registered Trademark 'KEKE NAPEP'.

The plaintiff is seeking among other reliefs an order of mandatory injunction compelling the Federal Government of Nigeria to remove the 1st Defendant from office as AGF and should he cease to occupy that office for reasons other than as a result of the suit, then an order directing that he should not be appointed into any office of responsibility in the federation until he has purged himself of the malady of interested partisanship and bias in public office.

In the originating summons which The Guardian gathered were served on the defendants on Thursday, Autobahn is asking the court to declare as unconstitutional, arbitrary, unjustifiable and ultra vires the inter–ministerial directive by the AGF declaring the KEKE NAPEP TRADEMARK registered in favour of Autobahn since 2008 as "illegal".

In a 55-paragraph affidavit deposed to by its Chief Executive, Mr. Alban Ofili–Okonkwo, the firm claimed to have conceived, developed and introduced KEKE NAPEP programme to the Federal Government, which in turn accepted the role of financier.

According to him, "I coined the term "Keke NAPEP" and that term is only one of several other others that I coined around our overall entrepreneurial concept of wealth creation, poverty eradication and technology indigenisation as depicted in our publication: 'Beyond Poverty Eradication published in 2005 particularly in pages 5 and 19.'

He further averred that the Defendants have for sometime been making desperate moves to edge his firm out of its lawful proprietorship of the Keke NAPEP programme, which it had created. "Being aware of this, we duly published in July 2010, Legal Notices in two national dailies, the Vanguard and Daily Trust newspapers. The said notice duly warned the general public that "the commercial acronym "Keke NAPEP" is a private creation and registered Trade Mark of our client; Autobahn Techniques Ltd and that any person who uses the term or acronym of "Keke NAPEP" without the prior license or consent of our client first had and received, infringes our client's Trade Mark and goodwill..." The said notice also informed the general public that "The Poverty Alleviation Modem called "Keke NAPEP" includes but is not restricted to the operation of tricycles. Autobahn Techniques Ltd is presently in partnership only with the Federal Government of Nigeria in the operation of Keke Tricycle."

The reliefs sought by the firm in the suit "

include a declaration that "neither the office of the Attorney General of the Federation nor that of the Minister of State, Commerce and Industry, is a competent court of record empowered to hear and determine petitions from persons claiming to be aggrieved over the issuance of a trademark certificate to the plaintiff."

The plaintiff also wants the court to declare that "the said Attorney General and Minister of State has no statutory or other power to direct, compel and/or purport to guide or procure the Registrar of Trademarks or anybody acting for her in that office, to sit in judgment over a matter in which she (the Registrar of Trademarks) had become functus officio or to cancel any trademark certificate issued in due course to a party in the absence of opposition.

It is also seeking a declaration that the Attorney General of the Federation acted ultra vires his powers and in bad faith and contrary to the rules of natural justice and fair hearing when he purported to have issued directives to the Registrar of Trademarks through the Minister of State for Commerce and Industry to cancel plaintiff's trademark registration certificate on the basis of a petition to which the plaintiff was not called upon to make representations in favour of retention of its intellectual property.

The company is further asking the court for a declaration that in acting manifestly ultra vires his powers and in a manner reminiscent of bad faith, bias and personal interests, and therefore over and above the call of duty, the Attorney General of the Federation has personal liability as 1st Defendant in his personal capacity to assuage and/or compensate the plaintiff in damages and that this is a circumstance in which the Law obliges this Honourable Court to award exemplary damages, among others

 



Source: Firm Sues AGF, Alleges Abuse Of Office