Is the judiciary out to truncate this democracy ?

The verdict, the other day, by a Federal High Court in Abuja, which nullified the candidacy of Mr. Ikechi Emenike as the authentic INEC recognised candidate of the Abia State APC in the forth-coming governorship election in 2023 has added to the long list of unbridled judicial interferences in the democratic process in Nigeria. Democracy is understood to mean the power of the people to choose who governs them. There is little or no role of the judiciary or executive in making the choice. What is happening in Nigeria has turned democracy on its head. It is an absurdity.

There is apprehension that the judiciary has practically and unwittingly robbed the people of their constitutional power to make democratic choice by electing who governs them. This is a dangerous aberration. The precedent is inimical to the spirit and purpose of democracy. There is a catalogue of shocking judicial interventions that have left Nigerians and indeed the world dumbfounded and wondering what sort of democracy is being practiced and entrenched in Nigeria. The latest incident in Abia State has, among many others, evoked sharp reactions from members of the public.

According to reports, a Federal High Court in Abuja has affirmed Uche Ogah, former Minister of State for Mines and Steel Development, as the duly elected governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Abia State. In a judgment delivered over the weekend, Binta Nyako, the presiding judge, nullified the candidacy of Ikechi Emenike who was earlier recognised by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) as the authentic APC governorship candidate. The Abia APC had held two parallel governorship primaries in the state that produced Ogah and Emenike as candidates of the party.

On May 26, 2022, the APC faction whose governorship primary was monitored by INEC reportedly declared Emenike as the winner of the governorship primary in the state. Subsequently, ruling in a suit instituted by Chinedum Nwole and two others, an Abia high court declared that Emenike lacked the locus standi to contest the election because he had earlier been suspended from the party. However, in another ruling, O.A. Chijioke, the judge, granted Emenike a stay of execution on the restraining order earlier imposed.

Thereafter, Emenike approached the High Court to determine whether the APC can refuse to submit his name to INEC. He also prayed the court to determine whether INEC can refuse to publish his name as the APC candidate for the 2023 governorship election. The court, in its judgment delivered on June 24, 2022, mandated the APC to submit Emenike’s name to INEC and for the commission to upload his name on its portal accordingly. The court also restrained INEC from accepting or publishing the name of any person other than Emenike.

But Uche Ogah, who was not a party to the suit and did not participate in the primary that produced Emenike, from nowhere, approached the court of appeal with a motion for leave to appeal the said judgment as an interested party. Opposing the motion, Emenike’s legal team had argued that the appeal court lacks the jurisdiction to hear the motion since it was filed outside the 14 days stipulated for filing of an appeal in pre-election cases.

On July 20, 2022, the Court of Appeal consequently upheld the preliminary objection against the motion in favour of Emenike. But Ogah went on to file a separate suit before the Abuja Federal High Court. Solomon Umoh, counsel to Ogah, reportedly told the court that the direct primary that produced his client was monitored by officials of INEC as against the indirect primary that produced Emenike. Ogah, therefore, prayed for an order directing the APC to forward his name to INEC forthwith as its duly nominated candidate for the 2023 Abia governorship poll.

Meanwhile, the APC and its national chairman, Abdullahi Adamu, disowned the primary that produced Ogah as the party’s governorship candidate in Abia. Also, Emenike, through his counsel, Lateef Fagbemi, prayed the court to uphold the nomination of his client on the grounds that he emerged from a primary lawfully conducted by the APC’s national working committee (NWC).

But delivering judgment in the suit, Nyako invalidated the indirect primary that produced Emenike as the party’s candidate. She ordered the APC to forward Ogah’s name to INEC as the duly elected governorship candidate. She also directed the electoral umpire to give recognition to the plaintiff. This judgment has thrown spanner into the wheel of electoral and democratic process in the APC as a party. As things stand, no one knows to what extent this contention would go and its impact. One thing is certain; there will be no harmony in the APC as a party in Abia State in the months ahead.

However, another High Court judge has ruled that Ikechi Emenike was duly elected as the governorship candidate of APC in Abia State for the 2023 elections. The judge further stated that all the processes relating to the primary election from which Emenike emerged as candidate are “valid, transparent, and lawful.” Luckily, this High Court is of coordinate jurisdiction with the Abuja High Court.

Furthermore, three different court appeal panels (two in Abuja and one in Owerri) have reportedly independently affirmed Emenike’s candidature. It’s more like an armada of court judgments. These judgments still subsist and are superior to the Abuja High Court judgment.

The APC, its lawyers and lawyers to the candidates have reportedly written strong petitions against what they see as the obvious bias of Justice Binta Nyako, who they say insisted that she must handle the matter whether or not the other parties liked it or not oblivious that her court is inferior to the Court of Appeal that affirmed Emenike’s candidature. The judiciary has succeeded in stoking crisis in the party.

Amidst the turmoil, it is pertinent to ask some questions. Why did a High Court in Abuja, which is outside the jurisdiction of Abia State, accept to adjudicate on a case already decided by the Appeal Court? Is it proper for a High Court (a lower court) to entertain to adjudicate on a case already decided by the Appeal Court? To what extent is the development legally sound and acceptable?

And again, reports have it that the APC and its national Chairman, Abdullahi Adamu, disowned the primary that produced Ogah as the party’s governorship candidate in Abia. There are standard rules for conducting party primaries in the state – the primary must be recognised by the party and secondly, INEC officials must monitor the process for it to be acceptable. If it is true that the APC NWC did not recognise the Ogah’s faction for the purpose of conducting primaries, why should the courts entertain suits filed by the same unrecognised faction to the extent of adjudicating in its favour? Where then is the party’s supremacy in all of this? The whole thing boils down to judiciary’s indiscretion.

A few days ago, I was in a meeting and the issue was raised that the way things are going in the courts, we may have elections in 2023 without candidates, going by the way the judiciary is giving judgments indiscriminately. Because the judiciary appears to be complicit in entertaining frivolous cases from disgruntled politicians, it now appears to be normal that for every electoral outcome to be decided in court before it is settled.

The other day, we read that a Federal High Court sitting in Port Harcourt, Rivers State has disqualified 16 House of Assembly candidates of the All Progressives Congress from contesting the 2023 elections for non-compliance with the new Electoral Act. The trial judge, Justice Mohammed Adamu, gave the ruling following a suit instituted by the Peoples Democratic Party for non-monitoring of the APC legislative primary by the Independent National Electoral Commission in suit number FHC/PH/CS/152/2022.

By this judgment, the APC may not have candidates for the Rivers State House of Assembly to be voted in the 2023 elections. There is need to appeal to the judiciary to help safeguard this nascent democracy by using the instrument of the law. At the same time, the politicians should not derail this democracy by hook or crook all in an attempt to pursue their selfish interests.