{"id":22987,"date":"2025-03-22T10:58:49","date_gmt":"2025-03-22T10:58:49","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/?p=22987"},"modified":"2025-03-22T11:02:44","modified_gmt":"2025-03-22T11:02:44","slug":"court-begins-hearing-in-%e2%82%a65-billion-defamation-suit-against-serap","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/?p=22987","title":{"rendered":"Court Begins Hearing in \u20a65 Billion Defamation Suit Against SERAP"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"p1\">A Federal Capital Territory (FCT) High Court has commenced hearing on a \u20a65 billion defamation lawsuit filed by two <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dss.gov.ng\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">State Security Service<\/a> (SSS) operatives against the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP).<\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s2\">The lawsuit stems from SERAP\u2019s accusation that the SSS raided its Abuja office in September 2024. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s2\">The claimants, Sarah John and Gabriel Ogundele, argue that the allegation tarnished their reputations and that of the agency. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s2\">They are seeking \u20a65 billion in damages, a public apology published on SERAP\u2019s website and in national newspapers, \u20a650 million in legal costs, and a 10% annual interest on the damages awarded.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s2\">At the hearing, the presiding judge instructed SERAP\u2019s legal team to review six documents submitted by the plaintiffs, emphasizing that any objections would be addressed in the final written arguments.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s2\">The session began with the cross-examination of Sarah John by SERAP\u2019s defence counsel, who contended that the claimants were not directly named in SERAP\u2019s public statements, making the defamation claims baseless. <\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s2\">However, John maintained that the allegations harmed both her personal and professional reputation, as well as that of the SSS.<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"p1\"><span class=\"s2\">The court adjourned the hearing to May 8, 2025, for further proceedings.<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Source: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.premiumtimesng.com\/news\/more-news\/782758-court-commences-hearing-on-sss-operatives-n5-billion-defamation-case-against-serap.html\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Premium Times.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A Federal Capital Territory (FCT) High Court has commenced hearing on a \u20a65 billion defamation lawsuit filed by two State Security Service (SSS) operatives against the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":22988,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[10426,173,10427,10425,580],"class_list":["post-22987","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-5-billion","tag-court","tag-defamation-suit","tag-hearing","tag-serap"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22987"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=22987"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22987\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":22991,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22987\/revisions\/22991"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/22988"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=22987"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=22987"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theblogonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=22987"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}