Professionals from Enugu State have advised the five Supreme Court justices handling the Enugu State governorship election dispute between Chijioke Jonathan Edeoga of the Labour Party (LP) and Peter Mbah of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to uphold the integrity of the court, their personal and professional reputations by delivering a sound and solid judgment.

The judgment will be a great Christmas and New Year present to the people of the state, according to the League of Enugu State Professionals (LESP) in a statement issued on Tuesday, signed by its president, Engineer Peter-Simon Nwobodo, and the publicity secretary, Barrister Matthew Eze.

“After 24 years of misrule by the PDP, the Enugu people voted like one man by voting overwhelmingly for change; they voted for LP in all the five elections conducted on February 25 and March 18”, the group said.

“Even in the results announced by the electoral commission, the Labour Party won seven of the eight House of Representatives seats, two of the three Senate seats, 14 of the 24 House of Assembly seats”.

The LESP said that the advice to the Supreme Court became necessary given what it described as the current ominous action of the PDP candidate and his agents.

“Immediately reports emerged that the five-man Supreme Court panel led by the Honourable Justice Inyang Okoro yesterday called the cross-appeal by Mbah’s legal team ‘frivolous, vexatious and a waste of time’”, said the Enugu professionals, “the PDP candidate hurriedly left for Abuja, afraid that his time is now up”.

The case between the two gubernatorial candidates was yesterday heard at the Supreme Court which adopted the addresses of both parties and announced that judgment would be delivered soon.

“The Enugu people are disturbed by Mbah’s unannounced and emergency travel, and the mission of this travel was never disclosed to the people.

“Many Enugu people believe that the hurried travel is part of the desperate attempt to thwart justice”.

The professionals added that “since the supine State House of Assembly approved a N170 billion loan for the state government, Mbah’s supporters have become so boastful in public about the power of money in Nigeria, even in the judicial quarters”.

The LESP recalled how Mbah has been mentioned in various frauds, including his detention for more than a year by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) for his part in official graft in Enugu State under Governor Chimaraoke Nnamani whom he served as the Chief of Staff and later as the Commissioner for Finance from 2004 to 2007.

“Just six days ago, his Pinnacle oil company was personally accused by the chairman of the Senate Committee on Gas, Senator Ajarigbe Ajarigbe, of collecting N10bn from the Central Bank for gas expansion but did no such thing”, said the professionals.

The company was also mentioned in the petrol subsidy racket, accused of receiving billions of naira without delivering the product.

“We, therefore, advise the Supreme Court justices to be careful with desperate politicians from Enugu State who forged their NYSC discharge certificate and outrageously inflated votes in their rural town of a few people”.

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