Supreme court rejects request by Abacha family to have access to frozen account

The Supreme Court has dismissed an appeal by the family of late Military Head of State, General Sani Abacha, asking for an order to unfreeze some bank accounts belonging to him and other members of the family.

The accounts, domiciled in banks in the United Kingdom, Switzerland, Island of Jersey, Liechtenstein and Luxembourg, were frozen following mutual agreements entered between Nigeria and the countries during the administration of former President Olusegun Obasanjo.

In a judgment in the appeal filed by Mohammed Abacha, on behalf of the Abacha family, a five-man panel of the apex court led by Justice Olukayode Ariwoola, unanimously held that the suit which was first initiated before the Federal High Court in Kano in January 2004 had become statute-barred.

Justice Amina Augie, who read the verdict on behalf of Justice Chima Nweze, the court affirmed the concurrent decisions of both the Federal High Court in Kano and the Court of Appeal, Kaduna division, which had both dismissed the suit for being statute-barred.