The Federal High Court in Abuja, on Thursday, adjourned a N10 billion rights suit filed by a Nollywood actor, Emeka Ike, against Lere Olayinka, Senior Special Assistant to FCT Minister, Nyesom Wike, until July 22 for further mention.
Justice Salim Ibrahim adjourned the case following an application for adjournment moved by counsel to the plaintiff, L.T. Adeh, to allow the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) appear in court in the next adjourned date.
When the matter was called, Adeh informed the court that the 1st respondent (Olayinka) had served its processes on them in response to the suit.
He said he would file his response to Olayinka’s counter-affidavit between Thursday and Friday.
Adeh further told the court that though hearing notices were duly served on both respondents, the 2nd respondent (INEC) was absent.
He consequently prayed the court for an adjournment to enable the electoral body to appear.
Olayinka’s lawyer, Akpama Ekwe, did not oppose the application but told the court he was prepared to proceed with the matter.
Justice Ibrahim said he would grant a short adjournment in the interest of fair hearing and to afford INEC an opportunity to appear before the court.
Ekwe, however, urged the court to fix the matter for hearing, arguing that INEC could not be compelled to appear.
The judge maintained that the short adjournment was intended to give the commission an opportunity to participate in the proceedings.
He subsequently adjourned the case until July 22 for further mention.
The court also ordered that INEC be issued and served with hearing notice alongside all processes filed in the suit before the next adjourned date.
The Nollywood actor, who aspired to vie for the House of Representatives’ seat for AMAC/Bwari Federal Constituency, Abuja for the 2027 general elections on the platform of Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC), lost the bid in a primary poll.
The minister’s aide, through a post on “X” in May, was alleged to have mocked Ike by leaking his confidential voter registration details on social media.
The post was said to have shown details of Ike’s voter registration transfer from Imo to the nation’s capital.
Olayinka was alleged to have used the screenshots, which appeared to be pulled from INEC’s restricted backend portal, to question the actor’s eligibility to contest the seat under the NDC.
The post sparked outrage, with many Nigerians accusing Olayinka of gaining unauthorised access to a password-protected backend system meant only for INEC officials.
Reacting, INEC dismissed claims of a major breach or external hacking of its continuous voter registration (CVR) database.
The electoral umpire attributed the unauthorised disclosure of Ike’s voter information to the misuse of valid internal credentials by authorised personnel.
Investigators from the Force Intelligence Department, Intelligence Response Team (FID-IRT), also grilled Olayinka and an electoral officer over the alleged leak of voter data from the INEC portal.
Meanwhile, Ike, in the suit filed by Adeh, asked the court to declare that Olayinka’s decision to publish his database on X without his approval “amounts to gross breach and violation of the applicant’s fundamental right to privacy and the protection of personal data”.
Ike argued that Section 37 of the 1999 Constitution, Article 12 of the universal declaration of human rights, and Sections 24 & 39 of the Nigeria Data Protection Act, 2023 guaranteed his right to privacy and protection of personal data.
The actor asked the court to declare that INEC owes him and other voters a “statutory duty of care” to protect their private data against unauthorised access.
The applicant, therefore, prayed the court to award him N10 billion against Olayinka and INEC as aggravated and general damages, to be paid jointly and severally for violating his fundamental right to privacy.
He sought a declaration that the press release by INEC dated June 2, in reaction to the viral publication and circulation of his personal voter information and private data on social media by Olayinka, amounts to a tacit admission of guilt and liability to him.
He also wants a declaration that the duo are jointly liable and responsible to him for breach and gross violation of his fundamental right to privacy and the protection of personal data, respectively guaranteed under the 1999 Constitution (as amended), Article 12 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and Sections 24 & 39 of the Nigeria Data Protection Act 2023.
Ike, equally, sought an order directing Olayinka to immediately retract and pull down the offensive post and publication on his social media X handle, @OlayinkaLere, containing screenshots of his personal voter information and private data.
He sought an order directing the aide to tender an unrreserved apology in writing for breach and violation of his fundamental right and publish same on his (Olayinka’s) X handle and three national dailies; The Punch, The Nation and Thisday.
The apology, he said, should run in the newspapers for two weeks, in order for that the apology to be widely circulated and made to go viral, replicating the similar publicity and attention, the offensive post and publication by the 1st Respondent, received on his social media X handle and public space”.
