"The time honoured principle to be borne in mind is that a successful litigant is not to be deprived of the fruits of his victory in litigation, except where an applicant has shown exceptional or special circumstances warranting such deprivation.
The onus is therefore on a party seeking the stay of execution to show that exceptional or special circumstances exist that will make the granting of the application desirable. See Vaswani Trading Co. Ltd, vs. Savalakh & Co. (1972) 12 SC 77; Balogun vs. Balogun (1969) 1 All NLR 349; Odedeyi vs. odedeyi (2000) 2 sc 93; Momah vs. VAB Petroleum Inc. (2000) 2 SC 142."
The Guiding principles for the grant or refusal of an application for stay of execution- "In the exercise of its discretion to grant or refuse an application for stay of execution, the court is guided by some principles.
It was stated by Fabiyi JSC in N.N.P.C v. Famfa oil Limited (2009) All FWLR (pt 480) 604 at 616 that: "The principles that should guide the courts in application for a stay of execution have been reiterated in many decisions of this court.
Basically, a judgment creditor is entitled to have the fruits of his judgment. And so court of Appeal should not grant a stay unless there are special or strong circumstances for doing so.
There must be some collateral circumstances and in some cases inherent matters which may, unless the order of stay is granted, destroy the subject matter of the proceedings or foist upon the court especially the court of Appeal, a situation of complete helplessness or render nugatory the order of the court of appeal or paralyze, in one way or the order, the exercise by the litigant of his constitutional right of appeal or generally provide a situation in which whatever happens to the case and in particular, even if the appellant succeeds in the court of Appeal there could be no return to the status quo; Vaswani Trading & co. vs. Savalahk & co. (1972) 1 All NLR (pt.II) 483; (1972) 12 SC 7; (2000) FWLR (pt. 28) 2174."
Per AKEJU, J.C.A. in AONDOAKAA VS OBOT (2011) 42. WRN 93
