All the political bickering and tintinnabulation of political jingoism that had become the character of the All Progressives Congress (APC) for reasons bordering on allegations of impunity and injustice by a section of the party may have come to a head.
This is sequel to the Monday Supreme Court judgement that dismissed the earlier ruling of the Appeal Court, Port Harcourt Division, which vacated a stay order made by a Rivers State High Court against the conduct of APC congresses in the State.
Recall that a faction of the APC led by former Governor Chibuike Rotimi Amaechi, and now Minister for Transportation decided to conduct ward, local government and State congresses to elect a new exco at the three levels on May 19, 20 and 21, 2018.
This decision was opposed by a section of the APC led by the Senator representing Rivers South-East District, Senator Magnus Ngei Abe on grounds of exclusion and violation of APC laid down procedure.
These aggrieved APC members led by one Abdulahi Umar and 22 others therefore proceeded to a Rivers State High Court and filed an exparte motion to restrain Amaechi-led faction of the APC from conducting the planned congresses pending the determination of the suit instituted by Umar, complaining against their exclusion from the party’s congresses.
In his ruling, Justice A. C. Nwosu of the Rivers State High Court, despite a mob attack on the State Judiciary allegedly by members of APC loyal to Rt. Hon. Amaechi on the day the ruling was to be given, ordered a stay of execution, restraining the APC from going ahead with the scheduled congresses.
But while the injunctive order of the High Court was subsisting, the Amaechi-led APC went ahead and conducted the ward, local government and State congresses on May 19, 20 and 21 that sacked the Davies Ikanya led-exco and produced the controversial Ojukaye Amachree-led APC State exco.
Thereafter, same Amaechi-led APC faction after defying the stay of execution order by the Rivers State High Court presided over by Justice A. C. Nwosu, proceeded to the Court of Appeal, Port Harcourt Division, to seek vacation of the order of the Rivers State High Court which it had already disregarded by going ahead and conducting the congresses.
Subsequently, the Court of Appeal, Port Harcourt Division, on June 21, 2018 ruled in favour of the appellant, Amaechi-led APC and voided the injunctive order on the APC as pronounced by the Rivers State High Court.
Not satisfied by the ruling of the Port Harcourt Division of the Court of Appeal, Abdulahi Umar and his 22 other colleagues who got the injunction order from the Rivers State High Court that was quashed by the Appeal Court in Port Harcourt in favour of the Amaechi-led APC which conducted the congresses in contempt of a court order, appealed to the Supreme Court against the ruling of the Court of Appeal in Port Harcourt.
While this was going on, the Amaechi-led APC on the strength of the ruling of the Court of Appeal in Port Harcourt that paved the way for them by vacating the earlier order of stay of execution by a Rivers State High Court went ahead to conduct the nomination and election of candidates for the 2019 elections on the platform of the APC through the controversial indirect primaries.
Also within the same period, the Magnus Abe faction of the APC continued with their own nomination and election of candidates that would also contest the 2019 general elections on the platform of same APC but through direct primaries.
Both were supposedly acting to meet up with the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) deadline so that in the end, they did not lose out despite the suit pending in the Supreme Court and the substantive suit from which the injunctive order was granted to Abdulahi Umar and 22 others, restraining the congresses of the APC which was not obeyed.
This substantive suite continued even after the congresses had been conducted against the order of the Court which Exco also conducted the Amaechi-led nomination and election of the party’s governorship flagbearer, Dele Tonye and other candidates in contempt of court order.
On October 10, 2018, Justice Chimwendu Nwogu of the Rivers State Court delivered the historic judgement after the first postponement, nullifying the election of Dele Tonye and all other candidates elected with him by the Amaechi-led APC on grounds of faulted procedure and violation of a court order not to go ahead with the conduct of congresses in the State.
Flabbergasted by this all time ruling by the Justic Nwosu Court, the Ojukaye-led faction of the APC which ofcourse, was put in place by Rt. Hon Chibuike Amaechi again proceeded to the Appeal Court in Port Harcourt.
And since there was a subsisting related matter at the Supreme Court by Umar and the 22 others challenging its earlier ruling, which vacated the stay of execution order made by a Rivers State High Court that seemed to have validated APC congresses conducted in contempt of court order, the Appeal Court in Port Harcourt asked both appellants and defendants arising from the October 10, ruling by Justice Nwogu to wait pending the judgement of the Supreme Court in the related matter before it.
It is this historic judgement in the appeal against the ruling of the Court of Appeal in Port Harcourt that was given by the Supreme Court Monday, October 22, 2018.
Justice Centus Nweze, in his judgement held that the court of Appeal, Port Harcourt ought not vacate the injunctive order against the APC by the Rivers State High Court on the Court of the congresses.
The Supreme Court lambasted the Appeal Court for judicially indulging the APC and vacating the injunctive order in favour of the APC when there was abundant evidence that APC was in contempt of court.
The Apex Court further held that the Court of Appeal ought not to have granted its discretion in favour of APC because the party was in grave violation of the order of the High Court.
Justice Nweze said that the Appeal Court has a duty to protect a lawful subsisting order and ought not to have granted favourable judicial discretion for a party that willingly disobeyed a valid court order.
“It is unfortunate and wrongful for the Court of Appeal to have entertained a party in contempt of a valid court order to the extent of granting judicial favour by way of staying of execution of an injunctive order when the party at the centre of the dispute was in gross contempt of court.
“It is a serious matter for anyone to flout a court order and in the instant case, it is clear that the respondent (APC) was in grave disobedience to two lawful court orders,” the court held.
According to the court, it is sacrilegious, ill-fated and suicide mission for the Court of Appeal to have departed from various decisions of the Supreme Court that any party in contempt of court ought not to be granted judicial discretion and in this matter Appeal Court is bound to follow Supreme Court final decision.
He said, what is more, the refusal of the Court of Appeal to be bound by the final decision of the Supreme Court is a gross insubordination.
The apex court therefore nullified and set aside the decision of the Appeal Court delivered on June 21, 2018.
On the Supreme Court judgement which voided the congresses of the APC, Senator Magnus Abe said going against a subsisting court order was clear senselessness.
“I am sure that you have all heard of the historic decision of the Supreme Court of the Federal Republic of Nigeria which affirmed the position of the High Court of Rivers State that the action of the party excluding members of this party from the process and depriving them of the constitutional right was wrong; and to do so in the face of a clear order of a court of competent jurisdiction is nothing but senselessness”.
“And so for anybody to continue to parade themselves either as a candidate of the APC arising from a process that has clearly been voided by the Court is nothing but political rascality of the highest order”.
“And I think it is time for right thinking members and leaders of this party to put this whole thing to an end and put the party in a frame to begin our hard-work towards the realization of our dream of taking over Rivers State”.
“Luckily the party conducted proper primaries here in Rivers State in the form of the direct primaries. And I believe that the proper thing to do is to do the right thing since the other primary was done in clear violation of an existing order of a Court of Competent Jurisdiction”.
From the foregoing, the Rivers APC seems to have shot itself in the leg for not being able to resolve simple internal wrangling that has metamorphosed into a phenomenon that confounds all political commentators and observers including the almighty INEC.
The Rivers APC to some people, deserves a special place in the Guinness Book of Records, having defiled all known theories in crisis management in the political history of this country.
But suffice to say in the words of Lori Dowdy that, “If it looks like a duck, walks like a duck and talks like a duck, it probably needs a little more time in the microwave”. That may be till 2023 Insha Allah!
