By SAAWUA TERZUNGWE and MUIDEEN OLANIYI

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and ruling All Progressives Congress are in war of words over the Supreme Court’s verdict on the review of its judgment on Imo State governorship election.

The PDP said it was a disconcerting endorsement of electoral fraud which places a huge burden on the court and the Lord Justices while the APC insisted that the Supreme Court’s decision to dismiss the review case brought before it by Emeka Ihedioha, the PDP governorship candidate, has re-affirmed its supremacy.

The PDP, in a statement Tuesday night by its National Publicity Secretary, Kola Ologbondiyan said the judgment had created a burden of precedence and fallibility on the Court.

The party said “more distressing” was the fact that the judgment “heavily detracted from the confidence Nigerians and the international community reposed on the Supreme Court” and the nation’s entire jurisprudence.

The party said all election stakeholders must rally to create “remedies for this pathetic situation created by the Supreme Court in the Imo governorship election before our entire electoral process becomes vanquished.”

“Our party abides completely by every word of the judgment of Justice Nweze as treated facts, which are truly sacred.

“Justice Nweze’s pronouncement, which went straight into the substance of our application represents a universal view about the travesty of justice that occurred in the Imo state governorship election judgment.

“It is indeed unfortunate that the Supreme Court had the wholesome opportunity to redeem itself and correct its errors, but choose to hide behind technicality to justify and endorse an electoral fraud.

“What Nigerians expected of the Supreme Court, since the error in its earlier judgment had been fully established, was to summon the courage to affirm its infallibility by correcting the errors and handing over victory to the rightful winner. Sadly, it failed to do so.

“For the avoidance of doubt, what the Supreme Court had done in this judgment is to uphold and legalise the writing of election results by individual contestants against the will of the people as expressed at the poll,” the PDP added.

APC sings praises

On the contrary, the National Chairman of the ruling party, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, said the Supreme Court’s decision to dismiss the review case brought before it by Emeka Ihedioha, the PDP governorship candidate, has re-affirmed its supremacy.

Oshiomhole said this Tuesday while speaking with reporters after meeting President Muhammadu Buhari at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

He said the APC knew that Ihedioha did not have the required number and added that the thought of imposing someone who did not meet the spread was only known to the PDP. “Because, they specialise in rigging and they see rigging as their birth right. And that is why they could have the guts to be protesting in front of foreign embassies as if Nigeria is a colony under the supervision of some foreign powers,” he also said.

Oshiomhole added: “I think what the Supreme Court has done today is just to reaffirm that they are supreme and whatever they did the last time was on the basis of what was before them.

“They did not make mistakes, there are no gaps, no ambiguity and therefore, there was no basis to reproach them to seat on the appeal in their own judgement. I think they are just being consistent with the position they took in previous cases.

“Of course, as a party chairman, APC members and indeed all democrats and all those who believe in the rule of law, who believe that as imperfect as the Supreme Court can be, they remain supreme.”

The appeal Chief Emeka Ihedioha had prayed the Supreme Court to set aside the judgement it delivered on Jan. 14, 2020. The Supreme Court, on Jan.14, nullified Ihedioha’s election as Imo governor and declared Hope Uzodinma of the All Progressives Congress (APC) as the winner of the March 9 governorship election in the state.

Ihedioha, who was the PDP candidate in the election, made the request in an application he and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) filed at the Supreme Court through their lawyer, Chief Kanu Agabi, SAN. They brought their application pursuant to Section 6 (6) of the 1999 Constitution as amended and Section 22 of the Supreme Court Act, 2004.

The application was supported with an affidavit sworn to by Uchenna Njoku, a lawyer. He said that the apex court was misled into giving that judgement, describing the apex court judgement as a nullity, and asked that the decision be set aside.

Ihedioha and the PDP claimed that Gov. Uzodinma and his party fraudulently misled the apex court into holding that 213,495 votes were unlawfully excluded from the votes they scored in the governorship election held on March 9, 2019.

They said that Uzodinma, while under cross-examination, admitted that he was the person, who computed the result that gave him the 213,495 votes alleged to have been excluded from his total votes in the election and not INEC. (Daily Trust)

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