The Court of Appeal sitting in Abuja, has joined the Attorney General of Lagos State, Mr N. J. Onigbanjo, SAN, as an interested party in an appeal challenging the right of the River State to collect Value Added Tax (VAT).
A judgment of a River State division of a Federal High Court, held that the state has the right of collection of Value Added Tax (VAT) instead of the Federal Inland Revenue Service (FIRS).
A three-man panel of the appellate court, led by Justice Haruna Tsammani, in its ruling on the application for joinder by Lagos AG,
held that the application was granted to enable the AG to ventilate his interest in the matter.
He said this is particularly since the appellant had made some allegations against him.
The Rivers State government had last month secured a major court victory over the federal government in the collection of VAT in the state.
Justice Stephen Pam of a Federal High Court in Port Harcourt had in a judgment delivered on August 9, held that the Rivers State Government and not the FIRS, has the right to collect VAT, Personal Income Tax in the state.
Justice Pam, in the judgment subsequently restrained the Attorney General of the Federation and FIRS (1st and 2nd defendants) from collecting VAT in Rivers and directed the Rivers State Government to take charge of the duty.
As a result of the courtâs decision the Lagos State government commenced a move to stop the collection of VAT by the FIRS in the state.
Not satisfied by the decision of the trial court and also the move by Lagos State, the FIRS approached the Court of Appeal for an order staying the judgment of Justice Pam and another order restraining the Rivers State Government from collecting VAT in the state.
When the case was called on Friday, after parties announced appearance, the Attorney General of Lagos stood up to inform the court of his application seeking to be joined as a party.
According to him, he would be prejudiced if the court go-ahead to hear the application for stay and interlocutory injunction excluding him from the hearing.
Counsel to the first respondent, Chief Emmanuel Ukala, SAN, in supporting the Lagos AG’s application, informed the panel, that part of the affidavit evidence of the applicant (FIRS) in seeking for a stay of the Federal High Court judgment is because the Lagos State Government is purporting to execute the judgment.
Ukala added that in the interest of justice the application should be granted.
However, both lawyers to the FIRS, Mr Mahmud Magaji, SAN and Attorney General of the Federation (AGF’s) lawyer, Mr Tijani Gazali, opposed the application for joinder and urged the panel to give preference to the appellant’s application for stay.
Gazali had argued that what is before the court is an application for stay and not the main appeal.
Delivering a ruling in the application to be joined, the presiding judge, Justice Haruna Tsammani held that the right of the Lagos AG to be heard is paramount and accordingly ordered that he be joined as a party in the suit.