President Muhammadu Buhari has been dragged to the Supreme Court by states controlled by both the All Progressives Congress, APC, and other opposition parties in the country.
The 36 states of the Federation on Monday sued the President challenging the executive order he signed in May.
The 36 states want the apex court to quash Buhari’s executive order on the funding of courts, signed on May 20.
The states argued that the president’s executive order no. 00-10 of 2020 transferred the Federal Government’s responsibility of funding both the capital and recurrent expenditures of the state High Courts, Sharia Courts of Appeal, and the Customary Courts of Appeal, to the state governments.
According to them, the order is a clear violation of sections 6 and 8(3) of the 1999 constitution.
The states claimed that they had been funding the capital projects in the listed courts since 2009, while asking the apex to order the Federal Government to make a refund to them.
A former President of the Nigerian Bar Association, NBA, Augustine Alegeh, led 9 Senior Advocates of Nigeria, SANs, who filed for the states on Monday.
Abubabar Malami, the Attorney General of the Federation, AGF, and Minister of Justice, was listed as the sole respondent in the suit.
