In The Queen, on the Prosecution of Tomlinson v. The Comptroller-General of Patents, Designs, and Trade Marks (1899) 1 Q.B., 909, A. L. Smith LJ: “Another case in which the Attorney-General is pre-eminent is the power to enter a nolle prosequi in a criminal case. I do not say that when a case is before a judge a prosecutor may not ask the judge to allow the case to be withdrawn, and the judge may do so if he is satisfied that there is no case; but the Attorney-General alone has power to enter a nolle prosequi, and that power is not subject to any control.” “It follows that his decisions (sic. Attorney-General’s), when exercising such functions, were not subject to review by the Queen’s Bench Division or this Court (sic. Court of Appeal)”
THE POWER OF THE ATTORNEY GENERAL TO DISCONTINUE A PROCEEDING IS PERSONAL
What this Court said in THE STATE v. ILORI And Others (supra) is sufficient for the statement that the powers of the Attorney-General of a State (and therefore of the Kaduna State in this appeal) are personal to him and are exercisable personally by him. Ideally, I think the makers of the Constitution were wise...