The legal bad blood simmering between multinational oil and commodities trading company Petrocam Nigeria Limited and Union Bank has further escalated as the company has expressed a lack of confidence in the ability of the judge presiding over the case filed against them by Union Bank to be impartial.
Consequently, the company and its managing director Mr Patrick Ilo have filed an application at the Federal High Court in Lagos asking the presiding judge Justice Rilwan Aikawa to refer the case to the Chief Judge of the Federal High Court for reassignment to another judge within the division.
This development is the latest twist in a case that began when Petrocam dragged Union Bank before a state high court in Lagos seeking ₦6.7 billion compensation for what it deemed wrongful debiting of its account with Union Bank. It had claimed before the court that the bank wrongly and serially debited its account maintained in the bank for funding a letter of credit.
However, before adjudication could be made on the case, the first generation bank had swiftly filed a counter-suit at the Federal High Court in Lagos claiming ₦10.1 billion from Petrocam and its managing director for breach of contract. It subsequently secured an order from the court freezing all of Petrocam’s bank accounts pending the determination of the suit.
The oil and gas company had swiftly contested that order in court, arguing that freezing its accounts would jeopardize its business operations. However, the case could not progress during the last hearing because counsel for the plaintiff was out of the country on personal business.
At the reconvened hearing, Petrocam and Mr Ilo through their counsel Barrister Gboyega Oyewole SAN argued for the freezing order to be discharged in order to prevent further loss of business and goodwill. They also applied for the case file to be transferred to the chief judge for reassignment to another judge. They argued that the case has been stalled repeatedly under the current presiding judge.
In his submission, counsel for Union Bank Ajibola Aribisala, SAN told the court that the plaintiff will respond to the application at the appropriate time. After listening to the arguments, Justice Aikawa adjourned to June 22, 2018 to hear and deliberate on the application.