Lai Mohammed Sues Newspaper For N100 Billion For Damages Over Article
Lai Mohammed, Nigeria’s Minister of Information and Culture, has filed a lawsuit against an online media platform in an FCT High Court in Abuja for allegedly false and libelous writings about him.
The minister claims that the article is “untrue, malicious, unfounded, and wicked,” and that it has harmed his character and reputation.
According to Nan, Mohammed is asking the court to award him N100 billion in damages against by the news platform for the mental anguish he received as a result of the articles.
The minister said in the summons that on August 3, 2021, Pointblank News published an exclusive piece about him headlined “Lai Mohammed in N10 billion Fraud Scandal as ICPC swoops on NBC”.
He said that his lawyer then submitted a letter to the media site requesting that the publication be withdrawn.
However, the platform did not retract the aforementioned publication. As a result, he went to court to seek justice.
On August 11, he said the site released another story against him headlined “Lai Mohammed, NBC head for showdown over N10 billion Fraud, Minister in Hot Deal with Interpol Most Wanted.”
He said, “The defendants made a publication described as ‘Exclusive Pointblanknews.com investigations’ and written under the very bold banner and title: ‘Lai Mohammed in N10 billion Fraud Scandal as ICPC swoops on NBC.
“They published another one tagged as ‘Lai Mohammed, NBC head for showdown over N10 billion Fraud, Minister in Hot Deal with Interpol Most Wanted” published on August 11, 2021.”
The minister argued that the contents of the aforementioned articles were untrue and intended to smear his character. He claimed he received numerous phone calls as a result of the aforementioned publications.
He requested that the court impose N50 billion in aggravated and exemplary damages to the defendants for libel.
He further asked the court to impose another N50 billion in general damages to the defendants for claimed libelous publishing, which harmed his character and reputation.
He urged the court to order the defendants to retract the aforementioned publications and publicly apologize to him in two major newspapers.
