A Federal High Court in Abuja on Thursday adjourned until July 22 for further mention the N10bn fundamental rights enforcement suit filed by Nollywood actor Emeka Ike against the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, and Lere Olayinka, media aide to the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike.
When the matter, marked FHC/ABJ/CS/1272/2026, came up before Justice S.O. Ibrahim on Wednesday, counsel for the plaintiff, L.T. Adeh, informed the court that the first respondent had served its response to the suit.
Adeh also told the court that hearing notices had been served on both respondents, but noted that the second respondent, INEC, was absent. He consequently prayed the court for an adjournment to enable the electoral body to appear.
Counsel for the first respondent, Akpama Ekwe, did not oppose the application but told the court he was prepared to proceed with the matter.
The plaintiff’s lawyer further informed the court that he would file his response to the first respondent’s counter-affidavit between Thursday and Friday.
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 second respondent 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 served with the hearing notice alongside all processes filed in the suit before the next adjourned date.
The suit stems from allegations that Ike’s personal voter registration details were unlawfully disclosed on the media aide’s official X handle after screenshots showing the transfer of his voter registration from Imo State to the Federal Capital Territory surfaced on social media.
Also Read: Emeka sues INEC, Wike’s aide over voter data leak
Ike contends that the information was published by Olayinka without his consent, allegedly after being accessed from a restricted INEC administrative portal.
In the suit, the actor is seeking N10bn in damages for the alleged breach of his right to privacy, as well as orders directing the removal of the social media post and a public apology.
INEC has, however, maintained that the incident did not result from a cyberattack on its database but from the misuse of authorized internal access credentials.
Speaking with pressmen after the hearing, Ekwe described the evidence tendered to the court by the plaintiff as ‘inadmissible’, noting that his client had not breached any law or committed any offense, adding that INEC had issued a statement to the effect that there was no breach of its servers.
“There is no case against my client. What my client published, apart from being in the public domain, does not contain any personal information. The only thing that document contained is the name of Emeka Ike and the transfer number. The second document contained his passport photograph and his name.
“So, you will agree with me that there was no personal data that was published as is alleged. So, there is actually no case against my client,” he said.
Meanwhile, Adeh said he believed that INEC “has no defense in the matter,” prompting its repeated shying away from the case.
He expressed confidence in the claim of his client, noting that the case will serve as a precedence to prevent future breach of voters’ data, adding that Ike was magnanimous to have only demanded N10bn.
“It is very possible that whoever accessed this thing must have also been able to access other records. So, it is not just Emeka Ike. But we want to use Emeka Ike’s issue and also ensure that this kind of thing is put in check. I think this is going to be a very interesting case, and we hope that the court will do justice,” he stated.
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