The lawyer of the newly affirmed president of the Nigeria Football Federation, Patrick Ikueto, S.A.N has declared unequivocally that he will not in any way join issues with Festus Keyamu on the interpretation of the Supreme Court ruling but warned the former NFF board members of parading themselves as the leadership of the football house.

He however noted that they would not hesitate to invoke the full wrath of the law should they discover that Amaju Pinnick and his former members are still functioning as Executive members of the Nigeria Football Federation.

“If we find that the Orders made by the Court are not been obeyed we will not allow the Court to be a toothless Bull dog. We will activate the court machinery. And I mean this seriously. We will activate the Court machinery and issue appropriate processes for the committal of the person, it does not matter who the person is, if they are found disobeying the Orders of the Court. If we need to enforce the Orders of the Court we will enforce the Orders,”

To avoid any doubt, the Senior Advocate of Nigeria vividly explained the ruling given by the Supreme Court on Friday, “The Federal High Court made an Order in the first instance and set aside this election and then they went to Court of Appeal and then we went to Supreme Court. Supreme Court by been the highest Court in Nigeria says the Federal High Court had the power to restore its Orders.

On whether they can now go ahead to appeal the High Court Orders, he said, “ Are they going to appeal to who?  And if they want to go and appeal against that Order that set aside the election. The first thing they should do is to, and this is the principle of Law being that they are in contempt already of the Order of Court, the Court will insist that they purge themselves of the contempt which is that they must firstly obey the Order of Court, otherwise Court will not hear you. And it’s no longer a question of now saying Court has no jurisdiction. Supreme Court had said Federal High Court had the power to relist this matter. So, they must first of all obey the Order of Court.

Senior Advocate I kueto explained more on what the Supreme Court actually referred back to the High Court, “The substantive case has not been heard. What happened was Orders were made by the Court. The Federal High Court made Interim Orders to preserve the Suite before it. And those Orders are what are in dispute. The substantive hearing in the case and the suite is there and has not been determined. But there were Orders made by the Court, which are valid and subsisting and those Orders will subsist until the case is heard and determined.

“But the question is are you entitled to disregard those Orders and say I don’t like these Orders, I won’t Obey these Orders. I want to hear the substantive suite, the Court will not agree with you, because if you don’t respect Court Orders the question is, why are you in court?

The Senior Advocate however had a word of advice for the former NFF board members telling them to display some level of responsibility rather that proving stubborn. “They should obey the Order of the Court which is, they should allow rule of law to prevail. They should advise themselves that we are here in valuation of Court Order; we are not promoting the interest of Nigeria.

“We have gone beyond the days of anarchy, the days of impunity and lawlessness. We are now in democracy. We need to give the international community’s proper image of a democratic Nation where rule of law is obeyed, where people abide by laws and regulations. That’s what they ought to do; they ought to say, please, we are sorry, we have allowed ourselves to be engaged in illegalities,”

count | 155

Parade yourselves as NFF board members and go to jail- Giwa’s lawyer tell Pinnick and co