Anambra Guber: Appeal Court Declares Ozigbo PDP’s Candidate

…. Urges INEC to stop acting on orders of trial court

BY VICTOR BUORO, ABUJA – The Court of Appeal sitting in Abuja on Friday declared Valentine Oziigbo as the authentic candidate of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in the scheduled November 6, 2021 governorship election in Anambra State.

In a unanimous decision, the Justices of the Court, set aside the decision of Justice A. O. Nwabunike of the High Court of Anambra State which hitherto declared Senator Ugochukwu Uba as the party’s candidate.

Delivering the appellate Court unanimous ruling, President of the Court of Appeal, Justice Monica Dongban-Mensem, held that the primary election held at the Professor Dora Akunyuli Women Center, Awka, which produced Ozigbo as the PDP candidate, was conducted in line with the law and the PDP guidelines.

The Appeal Court declared that the parallel primary held at Saint Paul University was an aberration and berated Justice Nwabunike for sitting as an appellate court over the judgment of Justice Adeniyi of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) High Court.

Justice Dongban-Mensem therefore counseled the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) not to allow itself to be distracted in preparation for the election.

It specifically advised the INEC to always endeavor to wait for the decision of the final court of the land and not hurriedly rushed to comply with the judgment of a trial court.

The panel of Justices of the Appeal Court took turn to take swipes on lawyers who enable litigants to abuse Court processes, stressing that relevant bodies like the NJC and NBA must take decisive actions against culprits.

The Court accordingly awarded a cost of N10 million against Uba in favour of Ozigbo.

Details later.