Former Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo has filed a legal suit against Punch newspaper and columnist, Sonala Olumhense, over an alleged defamatory publication on January 27, 2019.
Obasanjo is praying the Federal High Court in Abuja to award him N1 billion as damages from the newspaper and the columnist.
Olumhense, had in the article titled “This is the Best Contribution Obasanjo Can Make”, said: “Obasanjo was no anti-corruption champion either, although nobody harangues corruption better than he. Yes, he launched the EFCC and ICPC, but they fought only the fights he allowed them to and wrote the reports he wanted.”
“His real motivation was the largely retaliatory drive to recover the so-called (Sani) Abacha loot against the man who had thrown him behind bars. At the end, he could not account for the billions of dollars recovered.”
According to the former President, the article was “false, malicious, unjustified, injurious, scornful, distasteful, unsavoury,” and exposed him to “public odium, ridicule and disdain.”
