The Supreme Court of Nigeria on Tuesday reserved judgment in the suit filed by the Osun State Government seeking to restrain the Attorney General of the Federation (AGF) from releasing withheld Local Government funds to court-sacked council chairmen elected on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
A seven-man panel of Justices of the apex court, led by Justice Uwani Aba’aji, heard arguments from counsel to the parties, namely Musbau Adetumbi, SAN, representing the Osun State Attorney General, and Chief Akin Olujimi, SAN, who appeared for the AGF, before reserving judgment in the matter.
Justice Aba’aji announced that the judgment date in the suit, marked SC/CV/773/2025, “would be communicated to both parties in due course.”
In the substantive case, the Osun State Attorney General is asking the Supreme Court to direct the AGF to immediately release statutory allocations to chairmen and councillors “validly elected” for the 30 Local Government Areas in the state.
Besides, the plaintiff, who invoked the Supreme Court’s original jurisdiction based on a letter by the AGF according recognition to the disputed APC chairmen, also sought an order stopping the AGF from further withholding, suspending, or seizing monthly allocations and revenues standing to the credit of the constituent Local Governments, having democratically elected chairmen in place.
The grouse of the Osun Attorney General was that the AGF was wrong in his letter recognizing the APC Local Government chairmen when the matter was pending before the courts of record.
He also predicated his case on the ground that the election that brought in the APC officials as Local Government chairmen and councillors had been nullified by a Federal High Court and upheld by the Court of Appeal in Abuja.
Adetumbi, while presenting the case of the plaintiff, pleaded with the seven Justices to uphold his arguments and grant all the reliefs sought by his client.
However, in opposition, the AGF, represented by Akin Olujimi, SAN, urged the apex court to dismiss the case on various grounds.
Among other things, Olujimi argued that the plaintiff lacked locus standi (legal standing) to bring the case before the Supreme Court to invoke its original jurisdiction, because the matter is essentially between two political parties.
On Monday, a SaharaReporters review of Federal Allocation Account Committee data released by the Office of the Accountant General and the National Bureau of Statistics showed that the total amount yet to be released to the state government was ₦73.7 billion.
This figure represents the withheld funds for the period between March and August 2025.
In March, the state was expected to receive ₦11.9 billion; the amounts for April, May, and June were ₦11.2 billion, ₦11.7 billion, and ₦12.1 billion, respectively. Further review indicates that the figures for July 2025 and August are ₦12.8 billion and ₦14 billion, respectively.
Earlier, SaharaReporters reported that the Nigerian government had withheld Osun State’s local government allocations since March 2025.
Recently, a High Court of Justice, Oyo State, sitting in Ibadan, issued an interim order restraining the United Bank for Africa (UBA) Plc from releasing statutory funds belonging to the 30 local governments in Osun State.
In the enrolment of the order dated September 26, 2025, in Suit No. I/1149/25, filed by the Attorney General of Osun State and the Osun State Local Government Service Commission against UBA, the claimants sought interim protection over local government allocations.
The claimants requested “an Order of Interim Injunction restraining the Defendant/Respondent from paying and/or causing to be paid all and/or any of that funds which constitute the statutory Local Government funds of all the 30 Local Governments in Osun State as listed under Osun State in the 1st Schedule, Part 1 of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria pending the hearing and determination of the Motion on Notice for an order of interlocutory injunction filed in this case.”
They further prayed the court for “an Order of Interim Injunction of this Honourable Court mandating the Defendant/Respondent not to release all the said funds mentioned in relief one above and/or any part of it to any person however he may be, be it artificial or natural pending the hearing and determination of the Motion on Notice for an order of interlocutory injunction filed in this case.”