Wife of Nigeria’s former President, Dame Patience Jonathan is to pay the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission the sum of N50,000 as costs after she filed for the discontinuance of her suit against the agency.

Justice Saliu Saidu of the Federal High Court, Port Harcourt gave the order on Monday. The order was given in response to a request by the counsel to the EFCC, Kayode Oni that the court grants the commission the sum of N500,000 as costs it incurred while filing processes in response to Mrs. Jonathan’s suit. The court however granted the sum of N50,000 instead of the N500,000 demanded.

In February, Dame Patience Jonathan sued the EFCC for alleged violation of her fundamental human rights. The suit filed by her counsel, I.A. Adedipe, SAN claimed that the freezing of the sum of $20m in bank accounts belonging to her and her relatives was a gross violation of these rights.

Patience Jonathan, in the suit also claimed that ransacking of property belonging to her family by EFCC officials was illegal. She therefore prayed the court to compel the EFCC to pay her the sum of N2bn as damages.

The commission’s counsel, Kayode Oni however argued then that her suit was an abuse of court process. Yesterday, however, the wife of the former President was represented by another lawyer namely Sammie Somiari. Somiari told the court that he had the instruction of his client to discontinue the matter altogether.

At that point, Oni agreed that Patience Jonathan had the right to discontinue her case. He then requested the court to award costs in favour of his client.