Actor Emeka Ike’s N10 billion lawsuit against Lere Olayinka, senior special assistant to Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Minister Nyesom Wike, and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) was dismissed by a federal high court in Abuja.
Ike filed a lawsuit against Olayinka and INEC for allegedly infringing upon his fundamental right to privacy.
The actor lost the Nigeria Democratic Congress (NDC) primary. He had hoped to run for the AMAC/Bwari federal constituency seat in Abuja in the general elections of 2027.
Olayinka’s disclosure of private information sparked an uproar from the INEC database, specifically details of Ike’s voter registration transfer from Imo to Abuja.
Olayinka questioned the actor’s eligibility to contest a House of Representatives seat in Abuja following his recent primary activities.
The leak, which Ike’s legal team described as a grave violation of privacy and a threat to national security, sparked widespread outrage and renewed concerns over the security of Nigeria’s electoral database.
Many Nigerians on social media also accused Olayinka of gaining unauthorised access to a password-protected backend system reserved exclusively for INEC officials.
In response, INEC dismissed allegations of a large-scale security breach or external hacking of its continuous voter registration (CVR) database.
Ike sought a declaration that Olayinka’s decision to publish his voter information on X without his consent “amounts to gross breach and violation of the applicant’s fundamental right to privacy and the protection of personal data”.
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He also prayed the court to declare that INEC’s June 2 press release amounted to an admission of responsibility for the sharing of his private voter information on social media.
The actor asked the court to order Olayinka to delete the post on X, retract the publication and issue a written apology for violating his privacy rights.
He also prayed the court to award him N10 billion in aggravated and general damages against Olayinka and INEC, jointly and severally, for the alleged violation of his privacy rights.
However, INEC and Olayinka, in separate counter-affidavits, urged the court to dismiss the suit, arguing that Ike’s voter information was neither confidential nor unlawfully obtained.
INEC said it had the legal authority to make voters’ information available to the public without their consent, adding that the information shared by Olayinka did not originate from the commission.
Olayinka, on his part, argued that the suit was brought in bad faith, insisting that the document he posted contained only Ike’s name and passport photograph, which were already publicly available.
He maintained that Ike did not need to permit him to share the information, adding that the actor had made the same details public when he declared his intention to contest the election.
Olayinka also said the post was intended to remind Ike that he had transferred his voter registration and draw public attention to the relevant provisions of the Electoral Act.
He further argued that INEC had clarified in its press release that “there was no external breach of its CVR database, no hacking incident and no unauthorised external access to the commissions ICT infrastructure”.
Olayinka denied being responsible for any injury Ike claimed to have suffered, arguing that he was not a data controller under the Nigerian Data Protection Act, 2023, and had no legal duty to protect the actor’s information.
He described Ike’s N10 billion damages claim as “an indication that the applicant is a gold digger, who wants to reap where he did not sow,” insisting that he should not be made to pay damages for information that was already publicly accessible.
He therefore urged the court to dismiss the suit in the interest of justice.
Salim Ibrahim, the presiding judge, agreed with the objections raised by Olayinka and INEC, ruling that Ike’s suit was “incompetent and improperly constituted”.
He subsequently dismissed the main suit on the grounds of lack of proof.
