“It is quite necessary and possibly most of the time, if a court delivers a judgement and there is an aspect of the matter that you don’t accept, you can go to a Higher Court of Appeal against that aspect. That’s actually what happened,”
There will be a big debate at the Supreme Court as an embattled Ebonyi gubernatorial candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Chief Ifeanyi Chukwuma Odii has accused his rival, Senator Joseph Obinna Ogba of using fake delegates to secure victory during the party's primary for the governorship position in the state.
Chief Odii at the weekend while interacting with journalists, disclosed that he had dragged Senator Ogba to the Supreme Court as a way of protesting against Ogba's purported use of fake delegates on the June 4th and 5th PDP primary elections to allegedly snatch his mandate from him.
It could be recalled that the first primary election of the PDP in Ebonyi held on 28 and 29th May 2022 produced Odii as the governorship candidate while the second primary election held on June 4th and 5th produced Ogba as the party's gubernatorial candidate respectively.
However, Odii who interacted with our newsman through his media aide, Abia Onyike, expressed the optimism of getting a victory at the Supreme Court to fly the 2023 PDP governorship flag in the state.
His words: “Well, the Appeal Court said the matter should be retried, and there are two main cases; the first ruling of the Federal High Court which gave his judgement on the 7th of June 2022, that ruling was the one that senator Obinna Ogba appealed against, then, the Court of Appeal now decided that the matter be retried at the Federal High Court once again.
“The second one is the judgment of the Federal High Court sitting in Abakaliki delivered on the 19th of July 2022. In that particular case, the primaries held on the 28 and 29th May 2022 which produced Ifeanyi Chukwuma Odii as the governorship candidate of the PDP was upheld. But the second primaries, conducted by Obinna Ogba on the 4th and 5th June 2022 were were not upheld.
“It was cancelled because of two main problems; one is that primaries were not monitored by the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC. And secondly, the delegates that participated in the primaries were fake people.
“The authentic delegates who were elected on the 7th May 2022 during the state PDP Congress boycotted the Primaries of 4th and 5th June 2022, who produced Obinna Ogba. They boycotted it because, in their argument, they had earlier participated in the first primaries of 28 and 29th May which produced Ifeanyi Chukwuma Odii, so there was no need for them to go again.
“The judgement of the Federal High Court on the 19th July 2022 upheld that first primaries and nullified the second one based on these two basic inadequacies. And so, Anyichuks is at the supreme court to challenge the ruling of the Court of Appeal that talked about retrial and also to challenge the process in which Obinna Ogba was joined in that matter.
“It is quite necessary and possibly most of the time, if a court delivers a judgement and there is an aspect of the matter that you don’t accept, you can go to a Higher Court of Appeal against that aspect. That’s actually what happened,” he stated.
Odii further revealed that the primaries conducted on 28 and 29th May 2022 were monitored by the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, while that the second primaries conducted on 4th and 5th June 2022 were not monitored by the commission.”
He said: “Certainly we are sure of victory at the Supreme Court because the primaries that produced Ifeanyi Chukwuma Odii were highly transparent and INEC has written a report validating the outcome of the primaries held 28th and 29th May 2022. And that very report was very unequivocal in stating that the primaries were conducted legally and lawfully. And that the primaries were eventually very conclusive.
“And we used the authentic delegate list. And so, we have no problem for whatsoever reason. We want to believe that everything will go smoothly as expected. I’m not meant to in detail because the matter is still pending in court.”
Earlier, NATIONAL PANEL reported that the lingering crisis rocking the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Ebonyi State, took a different dimension, weekend, as the two Governorship “Candidates” that emerged during the Party’s primaries of 28 and 29 of May 2022 and 4th and 5th of June, 2022, traded words as to who was the authentic candidate of the Party in the 2023 general election
Senator Obinna Ogba, whose Governorship primary election was conducted on the 4th and 5th of June, 2022, told Newsmen in Abakaliki that he remained the authentic governorship candidate of the Party as he has received the Party’s Certificate of Return.
He assured his rival, Chief Ifeanyi Chukwuma Odio that he was going to defeat him in court against all odds.
But in a quick reaction, the Director of Media & Publicity, of AnyiChuks Campaign Organization, Chief Abia Onyike, called on Senator Ogba to stop deceiving the general public as to his current status after Party’s primary election.
“On the 10th of June, 2022, the National body of the Party obeyed the Court Order by forwarding the names of all the candidates elected during the legitimate Primaries of 28 and 29 June, 2022 to INEC and the processing of their forms has commenced.”
According to Ogba, “Certificate of Return has been given to me and the results of our primary election have been accepted by the PDP in Abuja. We have appealed the court case. Nigeria is not a banana Republic.
“Court doesn’t belong to anyone but to everybody. They will look at it and know who is at fault. Nobody can take the mandate of our people from the backyard. Am happy with the PDP delegates who expressed their choice of my person.
“The way I defeated him in practical terms is the same way I will defeat him in court. I don’t belong to hearsay or gossip. Ebonyi people shouldn’t be fooled.
"I' m going to serve him. I am the candidate of PDP for Ebonyi State Governorship in the 2023 general election. The case in Court is a pre-election matter. It will get to the Supreme court.”
In a press release titled “The time for Truth and Reconciliation has come”, Onyike further described “the parallel Primaries conducted on the 4th and 5th of June, as an anti-democratic intervention by some powerful forces who were hell-bent on reversing the popular will of the people. “
According to him, “The ruling of the Federal High Court in Abakaliki on 7th June 2022 restoring the authenticity of the first Primaries which elected Dr Odi was a historic confirmation of the democratic will of Ebonyi PDP cadres as against the dictatorship and imposition by a few Godfathers.
“The PDP Governorship Candidate today is Dr Ifeanyi Chukwuma Odi. He won the Primary Election conducted by the PDP on the 28 and 29 of May 2022. The 3-man Delegates List used for the Primary Election was the outcome of the State PDP Congress on 7th May 2022 which was eventually recognised by the PDP National Working Committee(NWC).
“That Primary Election was properly authorized by the PDP NWC and was peacefully conducted with the INEC monitoring the exercise in line with the Electoral Guidelines and the 2022 Electoral Act. An attempt by the opposition to cancel the successfully conducted Primary Election suffered a setback.
“The PDP Governorship Candidate in the person of Dr Ifeanyi Chukwuma Odi is willing and ready to provide leadership and to reconcile the members of the party after the divisions arising from the internal power struggle.”
“We appeal to the Leaders and members of our great Party in the state to embrace the path of maturity and reconciliation at this moment to enable us to focus on the common enemy as we gradually approach the 2023 general elections. We should quickly recover from the fallouts of the primary elections and close ranks in the interest of our people and the future of the state.”
