Lawrence Nwimo, Awka
The Anambra State High Court, Awka division, has dismissed a suit seeking the removal of Sir Basil Ejidike-led State Working Committee of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the state, Ikengaonline reports.
The suit was filed by former State Chairman of the party, Mr. Emeka Ibeh alongside Mr. Chukwuma Agufugo, the former State Secretary of the party; and Mr Okelo Madukaife, former Publicity Secretary of the Party in the State.
The judgment delivered by the court on Tuesday affirmed Sir Basil Ejidike-led State Executive Committee as the authentic and substantive leader of the Party in the State.
The Presiding Judge, Justice Ike Ogu, of Awka High Court I, while delivering the judgment ruled that the plaintiffs’ suit lacked any merit whatsoever or wherever derived in the first instance, noting that an Appeal Court judgment on the bone of contention subsists.
Addressing journalists shortly after the ruling, Dr. Iyke Oliobi, the State Publicity Secretary of the party, said the plaintiffs, Emeka Ibe, Chukwuma Agufugo, Okelo Madukaife and others who are fifth columnists in the party have been in different courts in the last fifteen months seeking every means and shopping for Court orders and injunctions to dislodge the validly elected Chairman of the APC and other members of the State Executive Committee that emerged through the State Congress that held in January 2022.
He said: “Their latest judicial trip to the High Court in Awka resulted in defeat as the Court affirmed that the prayers sought by the plaintiffs have been overtaken by events.”
He recalled that the Appeal Court sitting in Awka had on February 22nd, 2023, dismissed the judgment of the State High Court seeking the nullification of the State Congress of the APC that gave a four-year mandate to the incumbent State Working Committee down to the Ward Excos of the party for lack of merit.
He said the latest verdict of the High Court has put to bed their desperation to sneak back to office by causing havoc in the Anambra State chapter of the APC.
“These desperate insurrectionists were surreptitiously seeking a bizarre tenure elongation by clinging on a 2018 Congress whose mandate should have expired in August 2022 even if the APC National Executive Committee (NEC), had not dissolved the entire structure of the party from the National to the ward level on 8th December, 2020.
“They have refused to acknowledge the reality that the APC in Anambra State and indeed Nationwide have moved past the product of the 2018 congresses.
“A new mandate was donated to the ward, local government, zonal and State officials of the party in Anambra State in January 2022, after the conclusion of the governorship election in Anambra State. This is the only legal mandate in existence and no amount of judicial voyage by these fifth can change the present circumstance.
“The State Chairman of the Party, Sir Basil Ejidike, has once again extended an olive branch to these aggrieved individuals to join hands with the State Working Committee of the party in the State to work towards the emergence of an APC Governor in Anambra State come 2025,” he said.
