Press Statement : The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) completely rejects the judgment of
the Kogi State High Court, which unlawfully voided our validly conducted
primary for the Kogi State Governorship election.
The judgment is a classical example of judicial rascality and scandalous
travesty of justice which cannot stand, and for which our party will
stop at nothing in exploring all legal avenues to immediately set it
aside at the appellate courts.
The PDP holds that the judgment has heavily detracted from the integrity
of the Kogi High Court, threatens the reputation of the entire
institution of the judiciary if not immediately quashed.
It is completely unimaginable that a court of law will allow itself to
be railroaded into a voyage to the void, to the extend that it stood the
law on its head by importing and pronouncing reliefs on matters that
were not before it or even pleaded by any of the parties; to wit, a
declaration on the validity of PDP Kogi state governorship election
primary.
The conduct of the judge only confirmed widespread stand that the court
had been externally induced, ethically challenged and politically
compromised to undermine the case of the PDP at the Kogi governorship
election tribunal.
Already, our party has been fully made aware of how the All Progressives
Congress (APC) and agents of Governor Yahaya Bello administration had
mounted pressure on the Court to corrupt itself by twisting a matter,
which had nothing to do with the validity of our primary, to assist the
APC in its obnoxious plots against the PDP.
For the avoidance of doubt, Nigerians are all aware that our great
party, on the 3rd and 4th of November 2109, duly conducted our primary
for the Kogi governorship election, which was monitored and certified by
the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and which produced
our candidate, Engr. Musa Wada, who fully participated in the November
16th 2019 governorship election.
It is therefore instructive to state that the pre-election suit filed in
the Kogi High Court by only one of our many aspirants in the primary,
Alhaji Abubakar Mohammed Ibrahim, only sought the court to declare him
the winner of PDP primary election.
All the parties agreed that the primary was valid and concluded. The
only contention between Engineer Musa Wada and Abubakar Mohammed Ibrahim
was to determine who the actual winner was and nothing more.
In determining the matter, the judge found that Abubakar Mohammed
Ibrahim did not establish his case that he won the primary. Instead of
stopping at that, which is within the ambit of the reliefs sought and
opposed in the court, the judge strangely went ahead to sacrilegiously
deliver the script of the APC, to wit; declaring that the PDP Kogi State
Governorship primaries was invalid and that PDP had no candidate for the
Governorship election of 16th November, 2019.
This is indeed another sad commentary for the judiciary. How on earth
can a judge engage in a deliberate public rape of the Lady Justice, in
her own temple, just to please the pillagers of our democracy?
The following questions are pertinent; Why did the trial Judge proceed
to declare the PDP primary invalid when there was no such prayer before
the court? Why did the trial Judge declare that the PDP had no candidate
for the Governorship election of 16th November 2020 when there was no
such prayers before the court? Is the trial Judge a Santa Claus to award
judgments that were not sought for?
The conduct of the judge is completely unethical, a direct abuse of the
law and powers of the court to satisfy the interest of the APC and
Governor Yahaya Bello, in their failed bid to frustrate the retrieval of
our governorship mandate at the tribunal.
The PDP will take this matter to the very legitimate end and get redress
at the appellate courts and we have instructed our lawyers accordingly.
Our party believes that the ignoble conduct of the trial court does not
represent the overall attitude of our judiciary. He acted on his own and
must be seen in that light.
The PDP therefore intends to send a petition to the National Judicial
Council (NJC) against the trial judge as his conduct amounted to gross
misconduct, which our judiciary must not condone. Such judicial officer
should not be allowed to continue to bring the institution of our
judiciary to disrepute.
Enough is enough!
Signed:
Kola Ologbondiyan
National Publicity Secretary
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