Araraume Reacts To Tinubu’s Appointment Of New NNPC Board, Makes Request

Araraume Reacts To Tinubu’s Appointment Of New NNPC Board, Makes Request

Former Senator Ifeanyi Ararume has urged President Bola Tinubu to reconsider the appointment of a new board and management team for the Nigerian National Petroleum Company Limited (NNPCL).

Ararume’s request is based on a court judgment he obtained in April of this year.

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Appointed as the NNPCL board chairman in September 2021, Ararume was abruptly removed just before the board’s inauguration in January 2022 by then-President Muhammadu Buhari. In response, Ararume filed a lawsuit against Buhari and the NNPCL at the Federal High Court in Abuja on September 12, 2022, challenging his removal.

In April, the judge, Inyang Ekwo, ruled in favor of Ararume, overturning his removal and awarding N5 billion in damages. The judge declared Ararume’s removal unconstitutional and ordered his restoration as the Non-Executive Chairman of the national oil company with full benefits. The judge also nullified decisions made by the board appointed after Ararume’s removal.

However, the government appealed the Federal High Court judgment at the Court of Appeal in Abuja, where the appeal is still pending. Despite this, last week, President Tinubu announced the appointment of Pius Akinyelure as the Non-Executive Board Chairman of NNPCL, and Mele Kyari was reappointed as the Group Chief Executive Officer of the government oil company.

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Former Imo State Senator, Mr. Ararume, expressed disapproval of Mr. Tinubu’s decision in appointing the new leadership for the oil company.

In a statement dated November 30th, Mr. Ararume’s lawyer, Ogwu Onoja, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), advised the public against engaging with the newly appointed board led by Akinyelure.

Mr. Onoja emphasized that the appointment of the NNPCL management team on November 27th blatantly violated the judgment and order of the Federal High Court in Abuja dated April 18, 2023.

He said the court restrained the president from removing Mr Araraume’s name from the Corporate Affairs Commission as a Non-Executive Director of NNPC Ltd.

“This judgment remains valid and subsisting until this moment without being set aside.

“We state that the purported appointment amounts to a flagrant disobedience of court order and brazen disregard of the judgment of a court of competent jurisdiction. We are appalled and shocked that the President could brazenly disobey the court judgment by purporting to appoint a New Board and Management Team for NNPC Ltd instead of giving implementation to the said judgment of the Federal High Court delivered by Justice Inyang Ekwo on the 18 April 2023.”

Mr Onoja expressed shock that Mr Tinubu “has taken the laws into his hands to overrule the courts and usurp the jurisdiction of the Court of Appeal before whom the President has filed an appeal which is pending.”

He went on: “With the said judgment still valid and subsisting, it is clear as crystal even to the common man that the appointment of the new Board and Management of the NNPC Ltd by the President on the 27 November 2023, is illegal, wrongful, null and void and of no legal consequence.

“By this Notice, the general public is therefore warned to beware of those illegal appointments in their own interest. The public is urged to avoid having any dealings whatsoever with the new Board and Management of the NNPC Ltd as anyone who goes ahead to do any business or transactions with them will be doing so at his or her own peril.

“We hereby call on Mr President, who is a huge beneficiary of judicial pronouncements and rule of law, to reverse his decision and allow the flow of the rule of law.

“Mr President should have known that respect for rule of law is equally a strong factor in the attraction of Foreign Direct Investment (FOI), which he has been travelling all over the world to promote.”

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