A State High Court sitting in Yenagoa, the Bayelsa State capital, on Tuesday, June 22, threatened to jail the State Attorney-General and Commissioner of Justice, Mr. Biriyai Dambo (SAN) over his refusal to obey an order of the court.

The court had directed the state government to pay N1.006 billion, being payment for the construction of the State High Court Complex.

 

The court gave the directive in a suit No. YHC/26/2019, filed by Rematon Services Limited (claimant) against the state government.

 

Dambo, according to the court, has also declined the second order for the government to remit the said sum into the court’s account pending an appeal in a higher court.

 

It was learnt that the court refused the stay of execution motion filed by the respondent’s counsel, Mr.Tarilade Inomoghe, after Dambo refused to honour its judgment ordering the respondent (state government) to pay the remaining N1.006 billion of the total contract sum of N2,083,100,069 to the claimant.

 

The court noted that after the refusal of the Attorney-General to respect its order and shunned threat of being committed to jail; it ordered that the claimant (Rematon Services Limited) serve the respondent through substituted service by pasting it on the gate of the Ministry of Justice.

 

The judgment creditor, Rematon Services Limited, through Mrs. Boma Ojokojo, the widow of the former owner and Chief Executive Officer, had approached the State High Court to claim that the total contract sum for the construction of the Bayelsa State High Court complex was N3,563,100,069.00.

 

The claimant had said she only received N2,576,943,029,17 from the respondent and that the state government was still owing her (the claimant) the sum of N1,006,157,040,71.

Efforts by our correspondent to reach the Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice before filing this report was not successful, as his mobile number kept diverting.