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His Lordship, Hon. Justice B. B. Kanyip, of the National Industrial Court sitting at Lagos on February 13th 2018 gave a ruling in favor of NNPC and dismisses a suit for being statute barred in the case of Alhaji Summonu Adetunji Omole v. Nigeria National Petroleum Corporation & Another.
The claimant through his counsel Akinwale Kuye Esq. filed this suit by way of a complaint dated 28th December 2016. By the statement of claim, the claimant is praying against the defendants among others that the purported letter of termination of the appointment as Security Officer Grade II and as a pensionable staff of the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation and the contemporaneous contract appointment offered to the plaintiff by the 1st defendant both letters dated the 4th day of December, 1988 are ultra vires, unconstitutional, null and void.
The defendants entered formal appearance, filed their defence processes and filed a preliminary objection praying that this suit be dismissed. The grounds upon which the preliminary objection is based are: the suit is statute-barred; and the claimant did not comply with the statutory provisions requiring the issuance of a pre-action notice, thus rendering the suit incompetent.
Furthermore, the claimant argued that he first filed an action at the Lagos High Court (Suit No. LD/1476/90) before filing this suit.
The defendant argued that the claimant did not serve any pre-action notice to the defendants for purposes of this suit, as enjoined under section 12(2), which provides one month as the pre-action notice period.
After reviewing the argument of the parties, the Court Presided by Hon. Justice B. B. Kanyip, PhD, had this to say:
In determining whether a matter is statute-barred, courts are called upon to ascertain what the cause of action is, when it arose and when the suit was filed. If the period between the date the suit was filed and when the cause of action arose is more than the limitation period, the matter is said to be statute-barred. This suit was filed on 28th December 2016; as such we need to find out what the cause of action is and when it arose so as to ascertain whether the action is statute barred. From the reliefs of the claimant, his claims relate to the termination of his employment by the defendants.
I accordingly agree with the defendants that this suit is incompetent on that ground. I so find and hold. The order to make where a finding is made that a suit is incompetent is ordinarily one of striking out. Since I already made a specific finding that this suit is statute-barred, the only order that can be made is one of dismissal. The preliminary objection of the defendants succeeds. The instant suit is accordingly dismissed.
Ruling is entered accordingly. I make no order as to cost.
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