A Federal High Court Abuja has fixed 20 April for judgement on a suit filed by the Rivers State governor-elect, Siminlalayi Fubara, and his deputy, Ngozi Odu, to stop an alleged plan by their party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), to suspend them.
Justice Inyang Ekwo, in a short ruling, fixed the date after Fubara’s counsel, Dr Joshua Musa, SAN, and Mr Johnson Usman, SAN, who represented the PDP and its executives, adopted their processes and presented their arguments for and against the suit.
Justice Ekwo also fixed April 20th for judgment in a suit filed by the Cross Rivers PDP governorship candidate, Sen. Sandy Onor, and his running mate, Ambrose Emana, against the party and its executives over allegations bordering on planned suspension.
In a related development, the judge fixed the same date for a ruling on a motion moved by Dr Musa, seeking an order to amend their originating summons in another suit filed by the Rivers PDP Chairman, Desmond Akawo against the party which was opposed by Usman.
Akawo had sued the PDP, its National Chairman, Dr Iyorchia Ayu, and the Independent National Electoral Commission INEC.
Upon resuming the hearing on Friday, Usman informed the court that the PDP wrote a letter to the Chief Judge (CJ) of Federal High Court, Justice John Tsoho, asking for the reassignment of the case to another judge.
The senior lawyer said that Justice Ekwo was copied in the letter.
He said, “the letter, dated March 14, was received by the CJ on March 15.”
The PDP letter prayed to Justice Tsoho for the transfer of all three cases currently before Justice Ekwo and its other cases to other judges.
The party cited loss of confidence and bias as grounds for the application. But Dr Musa opposed the application, saying “he was unaware of such a letter.”
He argued that such administrative letter cannot serve as a stay of proceeding since no response had been received from the CJ regarding the letter.
The judge said he got to know about the development on Social media.
Ekwo, however, directed the parties to proceed in the matter but has not received any communication in that regard.
After the council adopted their processes, the judge adjourned the first two cases for judgment and fixed Akawo’s suit for a ruling.
Mr Fubara, Onor, Akawo and others had filed three separate suits against the PDP and 48 others.
Also joined in the suit are the PDP National Chairman, Dr Iyorchia Ayu; National Secretary, Sen. Samuel Anyanwu and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) as 4th to 6th respondents respectively.
They prayed the court to declare that the threat to suspend, expel or tamper with their rights as members of PDP and its candidates at the general elections on account of the disagreement between the party’s national executives and Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers where they hail from, amounted to a denial of their rights.
VON