By TAIYE AGBAJE

An Abuja-based legal practitioner, Mr Johnson Usman, SAN, has asked Rep Ikenga Ugochinyere to retract the alleged defamatory statements made against him.

Usman, through his counsel, Mustapha Ibrahim, SAN, made this known in a letter written to Ugochinyere who represents Ideato North and South Federal Constituency in the House of Representatives.

The letter was dated March 14.

The legislator was said to have allegedly made the derogatory and defamatory publication while addressing newsmen on March 13.

Ugochinyere had addressed the media following a suit filed by Usman at the Federal High Court in Abuja on behalf of four leaders of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Imo against him.

The plaintiffs are Mr Austine Nwachukwu, Imo PDP Chairman; Mr Thankgod Okeke, LGA Chairman, Ideato North LGA; Mrs Agatha Onyejisi, PDP Ward Chairman of Umuopia/Umukegwu Ward in Ideato North LGA, and Mr Carl Nwokoma, Imo PDP Vice Chairman/Orlu Zonal Chairman.

The leaders, in the suit marked: FHC/ABJ/CS/385/2025 dated Feb. 26 and filed Feb. 27, urged the court to order Ugochinyere to vacate his seat at National Assembly, having been expelled from the party.

Reacting, the lawmaker had accused Usman of filing the case on behalf of persons who were not members of PDP and conducted a kangaroo suspension, with a bid to ask the court to declare his seat vacant.

He also alleged that the senior lawyer field the case on behalf of a group loyal to FCT Minister, Nyesom Wike, to declare his seat vacant with no basis in law.

Ugochinyere, who accused Usman of initially filing the suit before a judge, said the lawyer secretly withdrew the matter and refilled another suit because they did not like the judge the previous case was assigned to.

?I don?t know how people become SAN these days. This case was filed by a senior advocate for that matter, J.J. Usman.

?I want Nigerians to be hearing o. They withdrew it and secretly refiled it. Again, same lawyer, same matter, same this thing?

?And they said it has been assigned to Justice Sulaiman?Same lawyer, a Senior Advocate, Usman or whatever they called him, because Wike group wants it.

?They want to destroy the whole of the judiciary and now set a precedence that people go, claim in their dream that oh, they have expelled somebody from the party and declare his seat vacant.

?What kind of privilege would that be???

Meanwhile in the letter by Ibrahim, the lawyer demanded a retraction of the derogatory statements and asked the lawmaker to tender an unreserved apology.

?The ordinary inference decipherable from the allegations made against our client in the said publication mean and was understood to mean that:

?Our client does not merit the privilege and conferment on him as a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, that our client is a tool used to manipulate the judicial system, that our client engages in unethical conduct as a lawyer, lamentably, our client is a person who does not worth to be called a Senior Advocate of Nigeria.?

Ibrahim, however, clarified that their client (Usman) is a lawyer who has distinguished himself in the legal firmament of the country; with clear record of an intellectually robust contribution to constitutional, electoral litigation and administration of justice in Nigeria.

According to him, his professional practice has consistently spanned about two decades of exploits at all levels of the pyramidal order of courts within Nigeria.

Against this backdrop, he said their client would not rest on his oars in ensuring an immediate redemption of the damages the lawmaker had done to his reputations.

?On the strength of this, you are hereby demanded that you retract all the derogatory statements made about our client on Arise News as mentioned above and tendered an unreserved apology.

?For good measure, the said retraction should be done within two days from the date of receipt of this letter in the same medium and other media outfitwhich has a wide circulation within Abuja and beyond.

?The apology must also be in written form and addressed to our client and same must be published in at least seven national dailies.

?Failure to comply with the above directive shall certainly leave us with no other option than to set the machinery of the law in motion towards the protection of the reputational image of our client,? Ibrahim warned. (NAN)

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