Supreme Court to Decide On Tenure Elongation Case Soon

After about 5 months  of argument in favour and against the tenure elongation appeal pending before the Supreme Court on Tuesday, the 7 man panel of the court led by the Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Dahiru Mustapher, adjourned judgment on the matter to a date to be determined and conveyed to concerned parties soon.

The court, however stated that its decision in the matter will be delivered very soon as it noted the importance of the case and it’s implication on the nation’s political firmament.

The Congress for Progressive Change, CPC, in Adamawa state and a gubernatorial aspirant on the party’s
platform, Gen Mohammed Buba Marwa, erstwhile Nigerian Ambassador to South Africa, had appealed the decision of the Court of Appeal which affirmed the decision of a Federal High Court on the tenure of office of five state governors, including that of his home state, Adamawa, which was elongated by the court Abuja.

In view of the effects which the decision of the apex court will have on the nation’s democracy, the Supreme Court had appointed 3 eminent legal practitioners as friends of the court, to address it on the appeals, both that of the CPC and Marwa on one hand and those filed by the Independent National Election Commission, INEC, also challenging the judgment of the Court of Appeal extending the affected governors’ tenure to 2012.

Leading a team of lawyers representing Marwa, Chief Wole Olanipekun, a senior advocate of Nigeria, argued that within the provisions of section 180(2) of the Constitution, before the recent amendment, that the spirit and tenure as well as the intention of the constitution is that except when the nation is at war, no elected governor shall spend more than 8 years in office for 2 terms cumulatively at 4 years per term.

He protested against the use of the affected governors second taking of oaths of office and allegiance upon their re election following the nullification of their previous election, as the benchmark for computing their tenure in office and submitted that the second oath taking is of no effect or moment and as such has no merit.

The senior advocate contended that where the same person emerges winner of a re run election, that the oath of office taken on assumption of office before the election was annulled remains valid. He submitted that the amendment of the constitution did not make any reference to oath taking meaning that a second oath taking was not important.

He further argued that the alteration of the constitution was effected to cure the mischief planted by the politicians in the interpretation of the constitution and pointed out that the decision took by the Federal High Court and the Court of Appeal over the matter was dangerous in the sense that, assuming a governor passes on, and a deputy takes over as envisioned under section 191(1) of the constitution, that deputy who had earlier taken oath of office as a deputy governor will take another oath for the office of the governor. Will the deputy governor now claim that his tenure begins to count from the second oath he took and not from the initial one he took upon assumption of office as a deputy governor? He queried.

He lashed out at politicians who he accused of employing inferior methods to interpret the constitution to perpetuate themselves in office and posited further that what the Court of Appeal and the Federal High Court did was to imply that the tenure of office of a governor is infinite and unending contrary to the provision of the constitution and urged the apex court to interpret the law correctly and upturn those decisions for the sake of the nation’s democracy.

Chief Kanu Agabi, also a senior advocate of Nigeria in support of the decisions of the 2 lower courts on the matter argued that the operative word relating to the issue in all the provisions of the constitution is the term “elected” and posited that when an election is annulled, that everything relating to that election is annulled.

He argued that taking oath of office is preceded by an election and not the other way. According to him, ” prior to the amendment of the constitution, the time spent in office by a governor whose election is nullified does not count but after the amendment, that period of time counted”

He called on the court to uphold the decisions of the lower courts and to dismiss the appeals as unmeritorious.

In its part, the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP to which all the governors affected by the matter belong and represented by Chief Olusola Oke, argued that oath taking by winners of elections should be the reference point in calculating the tenure of office and that the actions performed by a governor whose election has been annulled are not relevant in the determination of when his term begins.

Basing his argument on the provision of section 185 (1) of the constitution, Oke stated that it does not matter whether the oath taken by a governor was declared a nullity, that as long as the election which brought the governor to the position of oath taking is nullified, that all other things associated with that election stands nullified. He contended that it is illogical to hold that an earlier oath taken upon a nullified election will subsist for a fresh election.

He also argued that a governor’s prescribed 4 year term of office cannot be be predicated on 2 different elections but one valid election. He further contended that the 2007 election and the re run election of 2008 were conducted before the ammendment of the constitution which was signed into law in 2010 and as such cannot be made to be applicable to events which happened before the amendment.

On their own part, the friends of the court appointed by the apex court over the matter filed made submissions before the court as to their respective positions over the issue.

Chief Richard Akinjide SAN advised the apex court to uphold the decision of the Court of Appeal which elongated the tenure of the five governors while the duo of Chief G.O.K Ajayi and Professor Itsey Sagay called for the reversal of the decisions of the 2 lower courts.

Akinjide in his view, stated that the Oath of Allegiance and Oath of Office taken by the affected governors on May 29,2007 based on the nullified election cannot be a valid reference point for the calculation of the four-year term of office but that their four year tenure started to run, in law, following the re run election of April 30, 2008 as in the case of Admiral Murtala Nyako.

Prof Sagay, on his part stated that the governors should not be allowed to benefit from their wrongs adding that opening the court gate to an indefinite tenure of governors is contrary to the provision of the Constitution and Public policy.

Chief Ajayi in his submission advised the apex court to vacate the orders of the lower courts which elongated the tenure of the five governors.

The beneficiaries are Ibrahim Idris (Kogi), Murtala Nyako (Adamawa), Timipre Sylva (Bayelsa), Aliyu Wamako (Sokoto) and Liyel Imoke (Cross River).

By Nnamdi Felix/Abuja