*Dismisses govs’ N66bn suit

The Supreme Court has declared as unlawful and unconstitutional the Executive Order 10 (EO10) issued by President Muhammadu Buhari on the funding of State Judiciary and Legislature.

In a split decision on Friday, majority of the court’s seven-member panel agreed that the President exceeded his constitutional powers in issuing the EO10.

Justices Datijo Mohammed, Centus Nweze, Uwani Aba-aAji and Helen Ogunwunmiju are of the decision that the federal government cannot fund both capital and recurrent expenditures of the courts.

However, Justices Ejembi Eko, Adamu Jairo and Emmanuel Agim, in their dissenting judgment, agreed with the plaintiffs that the federal government should assume the funding of capital projects of the courts in the various states.

Meanwhile, the apex court in another split decision of six to one held that the Executive Order 10 was unconstitutional and should be declared null and void for contravening the provisions of the constitution.

Out of the seven Justices who sat on the panel, only Aba-aAji disagreed that the Executive Order 10 by President Muhammadu Buhari be nullified for contradicting the 1999 constitution.

According to her, the president’s order was made in good faith to check the excesses of various state governments in respect of the autonomy of states judiciary.

The 36 state governors had dragged the federal government to court over the funding of capital projects for state High Courts, Sharia Court of Appeal and Customary Court of Appeal.

The governors, in the suit, also applied for an order of the apex court to compel the federal government to pay them N66 billion being an amount they have so far spent on capital projects for the three courts in their respective states.

The judgment was on the suit filed by the 36 States against the FG on the funding of the Judiciary and the constitutionality of the EO10.

The EO10 issued by the President was then voided and set aside by six out of the seven members of the panel.

The court also dismissed the N66 billion suit filed by state governors against the Federal Government.