The Supreme Court on Thursday in Abuja shed light on the controversy surrounding its judgment on the leadership crisis rocking the All Progressive Grand Alliance (APGA).
The apex court said that the judgment delivered on October 14, 2021 was between one Chief Jude Okeke and APGA with three other respondents while one Chief Edozie Njoku was never made a party in the proceedings and judgment.
Recall, the duo of Edozie Njoku and Victor Oye are bith laying claims to the soul of the party ahead of the 2023 general elections.
Njoku was sacked as APGA’s national chairman by the lower court in Jigawa State and went on to lose at the appellate court as well.
According to Njoku, the Supreme Court had in its 2021 ruling on the leadership tussle of APGA, misplaced his name with that of Victor Oye, adding that following the letter addressed to Justice Mary Odilli of the Supreme Court, same has now been corrected, thus making him the APGA authentic national chairman.
He said: “I was removed by the lower court in Jigawa State. We went on an appeal and we saw what happened at the appeal court. We went to the supreme Court and things happened, but the Supreme Court is full of wise men and women and we took our time, asked them to look at that thing again and on Monday, it was corrected.
“They just took the name; it is just a name that was inserted where it was supposed to have been and they now put things back in place. We are going to have another press conference but what I really want to do is to thank all Nigerians who have stood behind justice, who have stood behind truth, all those who have laboured under the side of truth for the past four years we have been crying.”
According to him, a meeting of key stakeholders of the party will hold soon to chart the way forward, adding, “everyone who left our party, please come back. There is room for all of us. APGA is not an Igbo party but a party the Igbo have strong sentiment for. We need to be truly guided and I also have to choose my words.
“And I beg the seven members of the National Working Committee to calm down. We have to reduce the rhetorics of insulting one another. Oye is a gentleman and I have high respect for him as a former national chairman of our party.
“He (Oye) will be one of those I will reach out to and he is not an imposter. He was the national chairman of APGA from 2015 to 2019. We should respect him as the former national chairman of the party no matter his shortcomings which we can say are excessive but everyone has his own shortcomings.”
In his reaction however, Oye described the said insertion as “fake and doctored” and promised to make public the true state of affairs of the party.
In a statement signed by Tex Kpakpando, national publicity secretary of the party, the Oye-led faction said Njoku is merely out to create confusion for the party.
The statement read in part: “It has been the persistent practice of meddlesome interlopers like Edozie Njoku and co, to create confusion and may distract every genuine constitutional APGA activities .
“The integrity of the highly respectable apex court of the federal republic of Nigeria cannot be toyed with or brought to disrepute by anybody whosoever.
“This intermittent abuse and publication of the supreme court’s orders, rulings or judgements by Edozie Njoku and Jude Okeke should be addressed with serious measure to avoid unprecedented crisis.
“The Supreme Court should frown seriously at this and take immediate action. The Supreme Court of Nigeria should look into this matter and bring these offenders to book.
However, the correct the misgivings, in a statement on Thursday by the Supreme Court’s Director of Press and Information, Dr Akande Festus, said that one Chief Edozie Njoku who sought to be joined in the appeal was not joined and therefore not a party to the final judgment that resolved the leadership crisis.
The statement warned that any judgment order containing parties different from the parties on record did not emanate from the Supreme Court and should therefore be disregarded.
The statement read in part “Our attention has been drawn to the misconception being peddled by some members of All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) regarding the judgment of the Supreme Court in Appeal Number: SC/CV/687/2021: Chief Jude Okeke Versus ALL PROGRESSIVES GRAND ALLIANCE (APGA) & 3 ORS, delivered on 14th October, 2021, which is causing confusion within the party fold; and by extension, the public space.
“To keep the record straight, we wish to state that the appeal in respect of party leadership of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), which was filed in the Supreme Court against the judgment of Court of Appeal, Kano Division by Chief Jude Okeke, as SC/CV/686/2021 and SC/CV/687/2021, contained the following parties: Chief Jude Okeke (Appellant) and All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), Chief Victor Ike Oye; Alhaji Rabiu Garba Aliu; Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) as 1st to 4th respondents respectfully.
“It is worthy of note that the appeal arose from a Primary Election conducted by the party on the 31st day of May, 2019 at Owerri, Imo State, in which the 3rd Respondent (Rabiu Garba Aliu) was elected Deputy National Chairman (North).
“The said 3rd respondent (Alhaji Rabiu Garba Aliyu), by Originating Summons, commenced an action claiming among other reliefs, to be automatically recognized as the Chairman of the Party on the ground that the Chairman who was then suspended had been replaced by someone other than him..
“The trial Court dismissed the suit and confirmed Chief Jude Okeke as the Party’s Chairman.
“However, the 3rd respondent, unsatisfied with the judgment, appealed to the Court of Appeal, Kano Judicial Division.
“At that point, the 1st and 2nd respondents (APGA and Victor Ike Oye) sought for and were granted leave to be joined as interested parties at the Court of Appeal.
“However, the Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal for lack of jurisdiction as all the issues in contention took place in Imo State and not Jigawa State.
“Being unsatisfied with the judgment of the Court of Appeal, Chief Jude Okeke appealed to the Supreme Court against the aforementioned parties.
“It was at this stage that Chief Edozie Njoku brought an application to be joined as interested party in the matter.
“However, on the date of the hearing, the whole appeal was dismissed and all the motions for joinder were struck out, having been overtaken by events.
“That decision was based on the premise that such action had been severally adjudged to be unjusticeable by virtue of the varied subsisting Supreme Court judgments in respect of intra-party disputes.
“In view of the foregoing, we wish to make it abundantly clear that the Judgment of this Honourable Court contained only the Parties listed above; and that Chief Edozie Njoku was not added as a party at any point.
“Thus, any judgment order containing parties different from the aforementioned did not emanate from the Supreme Court and should therefore be disregarded,” the statement said.
Stay ahead with the latest updates! Join The ConclaveNG on WhatsApp and Telegram for real-time news alerts, breaking stories, and exclusive content delivered straight to your phone. Don’t miss a headline — subscribe now!
