Some leaders of the Law Students Society of Nigeria, who are in support of the ongoing strike embarked upon by the Academic Staff Union of Universities, have told the Federal High Court in Abuja that a N10bn suit recently filed by the rival Law Students Association of Nigeria to challenge the lecturers’ industrial action was instituted without due authority.

They stated this in their application filed on November 25, 2020 seeking to be joined as the 7th, 8th, and 9th defendants to enable them to oppose the suit on record.

The applicants led by the LSSN President, Aniebiet Sunday, described the National President of LAWSAN, Blessing Agbomhere, who claimed to have filed the suit marked FHC/ABJ/CS/1551/2020, on behalf of Nigerian Law students, as an impostor.

The applicants, through their counsel, Mr Oladimeji Ekengba, stated that LAWSAN was “never an umbrella body of law students in Nigeria universities.”

They added that “the umbrella body of law students in the Nigeria universities is Law Students Society of Nigeria,” adding that Sunday became the President of LSSN through “a unanimous election conducted by the association with the participation of students of faculties of law in Nigeria universities.”

The students added that they “are the duly elected representatives of Nigerian law students and are therefore surprised to have seen an impostor who sued the 1st to 6th defendants for embarking on a legitimate strike, which is their rights and also for demanding a better academic environment of learning in Nigerian universities.”

Agbomhere, a final-year law student of Baze University, had joined ASUU, its President, Prof Biodun Ogunyemi; the Minister of Education; the Minister of Labour and Employment; the Attorney General of Federation; and the Federal Government of Nigeria as the defendants in the suit, marked FHC/ABJ/CS/1551/2020.

PUNCH