Senate Dispute not over yet in Anambra North

Nnamdi Felix / Abuja

Controversial former Senator Representing Anambra North Senatorial District, Uba Igbeke, on Saturday in Abuja stated that the Supreme Court judgment which declared Lady Margery Okadigbo as winner of the Anambra North Senatorial District election has not resolved the dispute over who is the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party for the senatorial district.

Igbeke who addressed journalists in Abuja in reaction to the judgment said his appeal challenging the decision of the Court of Appeal, Abuja which set aside the judgment of a Federal High Court declaring him the authentic candidate of the PDP had not yet been decided.

He called on the Clerk of the National Assembly not to inaugurate Mrs. Okadigbo until the Supreme Court has given judgment in respect of his appeal which the apex court had slated for next week.

According to Igbeka, the National Assembly refused to swear him in as Senator on the ground that the Supreme Court had not yet given final judgment in the case. he therefore urged the senate to still maintain that position and not change or deviate from it.

Igbeke was previously issued with a Certificate of Return by the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC,in respect of the senatorial district. He expressed satisfaction with last Friday’s decision of the apex court only to the extent that the State Exco of the PDP lacked the powers to conduct a valid primary election.

“It is a good development because the battle is now between me and Lady Okadigbo. The Supreme Court has said that the primary that was conducted by the State Exco amounted to illegality, the question now is, where is the forgery I purportedly committed? Though INEC gave me a duly signed Certificate of Return after confirming that I was the authentic winner of the validly conducted primary, the Attorney General of the Federation used the machinery of government to suppress me. My travail was that I refused to serve anyone as a godfather during the last election. That is why Anambra North doesn’t have a representative in the Senate till date”.

He called on the AGF to follow the part of honour and quickly withdraw the forgery charge against him.

The Supreme Court last Friday declared Okadigbo as the validly nominated candidate of PDP for the senatorial district and winner of the election conducted for the district by the Independent National Election Commission during the 2011 general elections.

The senatorial district had not had representation at the upper legislative arm of the National Assembly owing to the series of controversies that trailed the conduct of primary election for the selection of the party’s candidate by various factions of the highly fractured party in the state.

In the lead judgment delivered by Justice Bode Rhodes Vivour, the court held that Lady Okadigbo emerged winner of the primaries conducted by the legally recognised faction of the party. The court also held that the appellant, Mr. John Emeka who brought the suit before it did not have the locus to have instituted the appeal challenging the Court of Appeal’s decision which returned Okadigbo since he did not participate in the primary.