The Lagos State High Court in Ikeja has authorised the service of contempt proceedings through national newspapers against senior pastors and top police officers over the alleged disobedience of a subsisting court judgment on a prime parcel of land at the Gbagada Industrial Estate, Lagos.
Justice O.A. Ogala, on November 4, granted leave to 11 Plc, the judgment creditor, to serve Forms 48 and 49, which are statutory notices warning of the consequences of disobedience of court orders, on some of the alleged contemnors by substituted means, following claims that they had frustrated the execution of a valid court judgment, reports The Nation.
The court specifically authorised service of the contempt processes on the first to fourth alleged contemnors through publication in widely circulated national newspapers, including The Punch, ThisDay, The Guardian or The Nation.
The dispute arose from Suit No. ID/1795/2009, in which the court, on December 6, 2022, delivered judgment in favour of 11 Plc, declaring it the rightful owner and granting it possession of a property known as Plot 5, Block B, Gbagada Industrial Estate, Gbagada, Shomolu Local Government Area of Lagos State.
Certified court documents showed that the judgment was duly executed by the Deputy Sheriff of the High Court of Lagos State, who lawfully placed the company in exclusive possession of the property.
According to affidavits before the court, 11 Plc enjoyed peaceful possession of the land from April 15, 2025, until April 24, 2025, when police officers allegedly acting under the instructions of senior officers forcefully evicted the company and padlocked the premises, thereby denying it access to the property.
Listed among the alleged contemnors are Harvesters International Christian Centre and three of its trustees, Pastors Bolaji Idowu, Omowunmi Idowu and Adedeji Agboade, as well as senior officers of the Nigeria Police Force, including CSP Mariam Ogunmolasuyi of the Anti-Piracy Unit, Mr. Adegoke Fayoade, the Assistant Inspector General of Police in charge of Zone 2, Onikan, Lagos, and the Inspector General of Police, Kayode Egbetokun.
In an affidavit sworn to by Gbenga Onilude, a litigation officer at BA LAW LLP, solicitors to 11 Plc, the company alleged that the religious body and its trustees, described as privies of one of the judgment debtors, Ayodele Eniola, Esq., continued to assert ownership over the land despite the subsisting judgment of the court.
The company further accused the police officers of exceeding their constitutional powers by reopening issues of ownership and title already conclusively determined by the court.
The affidavit alleged that officers attached to Zone 2 Police Command invited the parties on several occasions and purportedly examined title documents and court judgments, effectively sitting as an appellate court over a binding High Court decision.
It was further alleged that while the police locked the judgment creditor out of the property, they granted the rival claimants unrestricted access to the same premises in clear violation of the court’s orders.
Court records further showed that no appeal has been filed by the judgment debtors challenging the December 2022 judgment or the perpetual injunctive reliefs granted in favour of 11 Plc.
The company maintained that the continued occupation of the property and refusal to vacate it amounted to a flagrant act of contempt and a direct affront to the authority of the court.
