APGA faults attempts to modify Supreme Court ruling

The All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) has decried attempts to modify the Supreme Court’s judgment on the lingering leadership crisis in the party.

Chief Edozie Njoku, who emerged from the 2019 Convention of the party in Owerri, Imo State, as National Chairman, told journalists in Abuja, yesterday, that since the five apex court justices corrected the clerical errors on its ruling, some entrenched political interests had been trying to misinterpret the judgment.

Njoku disclosed that a two-page letter purportedly written on Thursday, September 1, 2022, by Dr. Festus Akande, Director, Press and Information, and circulated in the media, was neither stamped nor was on the letterhead of the Supreme Court.

He stated: “Within two hours, this plain sheet press release got to the Chairman of Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and he, in turn, shared it among the top hierarchy of INEC and his friends.

“The ‘press release’ claimed that Edozie Njoku was not a respondent in the Jude Okeke Supreme Court case against INEC, APGA and Ors. It further claimed that Njoku tried to join the case but his case was dismissed because it had been overtaken by events.

“However, the so-called press release stated that the case started from the APGA Owerri Convention of May 31, 2019, where Edozie Njoku was elected national chairman of APGA.”

The embattled APGA chairman, therefore, called the attention of Nigerians to the concerted efforts of enemies of the rule of law to twist the apex court judgment, which he said resolved the leadership crisis in the party.

While recalling how a Federal High Court in Abuja had recognised the APGA convention held in Owerri as authentic, Njoku explained that it was after his election at that convention that Okeke went to a Jigawa High Court claiming that he had been suspended.

“It was the same Jigawa High Court matter that the Appeal Court in Kano described as forum shopping dismissed the appeal and gave the order for things to return to status quo.

“This is the same matter that ended up at the Supreme Court and a panel of five justices led by Mary Peter-Odili held that the removal of the chairman of a political party was ‘non-justiciable’ because it was an internal affair of the party,” Njoku stated.

He, therefore, contended that it was curious that Prof. Yakubu Mahmood, who, on August 31, 2022, told some top government functionaries, that he was unaware of the Supreme Court case on APGA, was distributing a statement on the same case written on a plain sheet purported to be from the Supreme Court.

Njoku added: “Note that INEC was a party to this case from Jigawa High Court to Kano Appeal Court to the Supreme Court. Yet, the professor claimed ignorance of the matter. But the same INEC chairman did not see the absurdity in distributing the plain sheet press release to his colleagues and friends.
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To say that the INEC chairman has been compromised is a fact that has been obvious to any discerning mind for a long time. We commend Akande for his courage to have rested the unnecessary confusion over the inclusion of Njoku as a respondent.”

e called for caution among political stakeholders to ensure that the 2023 general election and Nigeria’s democracy are not endangered by overzealousness or attempt to violate extant laws.