A High Court sitting in Abakaliki, Ebonyi State capital, yesterday granted an interim injunction restraining the state House of Assembly and the Speaker from continuing with the impeachment proceedings against Governor Martin Elechi.

The presiding judge, Justice John Igboji, while ruling on the motion ex-parte brought before him by the counsel to the applicant (Governor Elechi), ordered that state House of Assembly should discontinue the impeachment proceedings without causing the applicant to be served with notice of impeachment, pending the determination of the substantive application.

Justice Igboji also restrained the chief judge of the state from constituting a panel of seven persons to investigate the allegation of improprieties levelled against the governor, pending the determination of the substantive application.

He further granted leave to the governor to serve the application for enforcement of fundamental rights and other processes connected with the suit to the 1st to 7th respondents to wit, by the delivery to the office of the clerk of the state Assembly, on the chief judge by the delivery to the office of chief registrar of the High Court, Abakaliki, on the police commissioner and the inspector general of police and on the attorney general and minister of justice of Nigeria by courier dispatch.

The judge, however, adjourned the substantive matter to Tuesday, March 10, 2015.

Reacting to the injunction, the Chief Press Secretary to Governor Elechi, Dr. Onyekachi Eni, said Governor Elechi had not been served with the impeachment notice, stressing that “nothing is right unless it is right.”

•Adapted from a Daily Sun report. Photo shows Governor Elechi.

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