Court nullifies Jimoh Ibrahim’s take-over of Newswatch

The court also awarded N15.7 million damages against the respondents as well as an order halting further publications of Newswatch Daily among other reliefs sought by the petitioners.
The minority shareholders who petitioned were Mr. Nuhu Aruwa  and Prof. Jibril Aminu while the respondents were Newswatch Communications Limited, Global Media Mirror Limited, Ibrahim, Newswatch Newspapers and the Corporate Affairs Commission.
 Justice Ibrahim Buba upheld all the prayers of the minority shareholders who had filed the suit challenging the validity of the takeover of the company, maintaining that the respondents could not prove that they paid up for the shares.
Justice Buba said the case of the petitioners had merit.  The court grants all the reliefs as set out on the petition at the inception of this case as follows: an order setting aside the contract entered into between the first and second respondent companies by virtue of a document titled “Share  Purchase Agreement” between Newswatch Communications Limited “Seller” and Global Media Mirror Limited “Buyer” and executed by the parties therein on or about May, 2011.
The court said the findings of Justice Okon Abang in his judgment earlier delivered in a related suit were not binding.
Aruwa and Prof. Aminu had filed the action seeking an interlocutory injunction restraining the first to fourth respondents by themselves, their agents or privies from publishing and selling to the public or causing to be published and sold to the public newspapers known as Daily Newswatch, Saturday Newswatch and Sunday Newswatch as advertised in the National Mirror Newspaper of January 15, 2013 pending the hearing and determination of the substantial suit.