Not too long ago, about three to fours years back, what the major problem was for the twin brothers pop group P-Square was their tense separation from each other for a minute, which everyone felt wasn’t supposed to be.

Now that their 5-year-rift has ended, trouble still remains after several years of everything going quietly good. A Supreme Court verdict will no doubt take a huge bite out of their finances in the form of a ₦28.5million judgment debt that was placed on them all of sudden following their breach of performance contract 13 years ago.

Back in 2011, a show promoter, Mr Patrick Arueze had invited them to perform at a Benin City, Edo State concert but the brothers Paul and Peter Okoye, alongside their other sibling Jude had failed to turn up, which is why they all got sued afterwards.

Instead of taking responsibility, it seemed that the trio tried to evade the instruction of the Edo State High Court asking them to compensate the show promoter for the breach.

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According to reports, after writing a cheque of ₦25million that was granted by the high court as amends in October 2016, the brothers instituted an appeal through their legal counsel for the payment to freeze which apparently meant the money could not be paid through the bank.

In the recent judgment by the Supreme Court, that was corrected. It affirmed the 2016 verdict by the Appeals Court categorising the cheque freezing as invalid. Hence, an extra 20 percent was added to the initial ₦25million judgment.

Quiet sadly, this requires P-Square and their manager, Jude Okoye, in 2024, to pay a total sum of ₦28.5million that ultimately means Mr Arueze will be smiling widely to the bank. The litigant will also feel like justice has been finally served after several years of delay.

Painting the background that led to the verdict, the show promoter’s chief legal counsel E. O. Afolabi, said that Arueze got judgment against them and they now sent a cheque but when we wanted to cash the cheque, they went to court to stop it, the court refused, they went to the Court of Appeal which also refused their stay of execution, they went to Supreme Court and the lawyer now joined the bank who is not a party to the suit at the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court was not happy and awarded N1m cost against P-Square and their lawyer did not appear.

With this judgment, he adds, the applicants are to pay over Twenty five point eight million naira having accumulated since 2014 with 20 percent interest.

Work hard , invest and spend wisely 🧠 nobi everybody be thief 🫡 pic.twitter.com/9JOQaNlzB0

— Rudeboy (@rudeboypsquare) April 27, 2024

At the moment, there is no pondering on this sudden heartbreak on either side of P-Square. Peter has the concern about a money claim going so wrong and so is Paul feeling quite appreciative on his achievements so far.

On both covers of the aisle, actually there is only a focus and an awareness on the success these super talented brothers of a ripening 2000s have garnered so far and not imminent losses they look certain to incur.

Ayodele Johnson

Ayodelé is a Lagos-based journalist and the Content and Editorial Coordinator at Meiza. All around the megacity, I am steering diverse lifestyle magazine audiences with ingenious hacks and insights that spur fast, informed decisions in their busy lives.