By Abdulwahab  Abdulah

The embattled former Director of the Nigerian Stock Exchange, (NSE), Prof. Ndi Okereke-Onyiuke and her sacked colleagues have secured an order of the Lagos High court restraining the Securities and Exchange Commission, SEC and three others from further publishing or circulating the outcome of an inquiry on NSE and its management by some auditing firms.

The order of the court secured by the claimants, led Prof. Onyuike, joined in separate suits by Mrs Yinka Idowu and Mr Uzoma Henry Onyekuru were gotten from different courts which barred the respondents and their privies from further publishing or circulating the report of the inquiry carried out on NSE under the leadership of Prof. Onyiuke by SEC.

Joined as respondents in the suits were The Securities and Exchange Commission, SEC, The Nigerian Stock Exchange, NSE, and the firms hired by SEC, Messrs Aluko & Oyebode and Messrs KPMG Professional Services for the audit.

Ruling on the motion Ex-parte brought pursuant to Section 46 of the 1999 Constitution, Order 4 Rule 3 (4) of the Fundamental Right (Enforcement Procedure) Rules, 2009 filed by the Claimants’ counsel, Chief Robert Clarke, SAN, Justice  A. Adebajo granted an interim order restraining the respondents , “their agents, privies, nominees, appointees, from further causing to be acted upon in any manner howsoever the report of its purported findings in respect on the inquiry the 3rd and 4th respondents were commissioned by the 1st and 2nd respondents to carry out on the affairs of the 2nd respondent pending the hearing and determination of the substantive application.”

The court also granted an interim order restraining the respondents, “from distributing, publishing or circulating the minutes, proceedings, report and recommendations or any findings arising from the said inquiry undertaken by the 3rd and 4th respondents and commissioned by the 1st and the 2nd respondent pending the determination of the substantive application.”

The same order was granted by Justice Ayo Phillips on the motion filed by Mrs Yinka Idowu, a former Manager with the NSE.  Also, the court ordered that the applicants should serve the respondents with the court processes within 24 hours of the court’s order.

In their motion on notice, the claimants averred that they were one time  senior officials with the NSE, and that they were not invited top make their defence or give them notice of the pendency of inquiries into their tenure in the NSE.

They argued that contrary to what ought to be, the respondents never invited them, but “delivered their ‘findings’, under the pretext that same had been procured through due legal process, to the media and same has since been published and circulated widely within and outside the chores of Nigeria.

It was further argued that already, the said report has become the subject matter in the main suit before the court.
The matter has been slated for November 22, 2010 for hearing.