The Federal High Court, Abuja, has adjourned a suit alleging that the Ethiopian government lacks budgetary allocation to cater for the feeding and welfare of detained Nigerians.
The suit, marked FHC/ABJ/CS/303/2024, was filed by a Lagos-based businessman, Mmaduagwu Sunday, and two others, against the Nigeria in Diaspora Commission (NIDCOM), Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the House of Representatives and others.
The applicant, who stated he sued on behalf of the Nigerians imprisoned and detained in Kaliti, Ethiopian prison, alleged that many of them are dying and suffering.
He said the Nigerian inmates were informed by Ethiopian prison officials that their government had asked the Nigerian embassy to come and take them back to Nigeria as “they have no budget to feed them.”
The Nigerian inmates “have no money, no food, no firewood and no medicine,” the suit alleged.
In the suit seen by Nairametrics, the applicant claimed the detainees have all along cried out to the Nigerian embassy in Ethiopia, noting that the diplomatic office allegedly came to witness the removal of the dead among them but is not making efforts to return them back to Nigeria.
He added,
He asked the court to compel the Federal Government to return the detained Nigerians.
He sought the following declarations,
When the matter was called on Friday, the applicant’s counsel, Nicodemus Okoye, told Justice Inyang Ekwo that none of the respondents had filed a response to his suit.
An Assistant Chief State Counsel to the Attorney General of the Federation (fifth defendant), Olayinka Akale, confirmed she was yet to file her response.
The judge warned the AGF counsel that if she files and serves any process on the next day of hearing, he will penalize her.