David-Chyddy Eleke in Awka and Wole Ayodele in Jalingo
The Anambra and Taraba states’ chapters of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) yesterday protested against the removal of Hon. Emeka Ihedioha as governor of Imo State by the Supreme Court and subsequent declaration of Senator Hope Uzodinma as governor of the state.
Members of the main opposition party in their thousands who thronged the Anambra State judiciary complex, led by the state Chairman, Mr. Ndubuisi Nwobu, called on President Muhammadu Buhari to quickly wade into the matter, while also urging the judges of the Supreme Court to reverse themselves, describing the judgment as a travesty of justice.
Nwobu, who addressed journalists at the complex, said: “We request that the judiciary should act as an independent arm of government.
“PDP in Anambra State wish to state clearly its unreserved rejection of the Supreme Court judgment delivered on January 14, 2020, with respect to the governorship election of Imo State.
“They want to foist Hope Uzodinma on the people of Imo State. There is no way a panel of seven judges, no matter how erudite, can sit and decide the fate of the Imo people, after the people have made their choice.
“There have been instances where the Supreme Court reversed itself; so, we are calling to question that judgment and asking the judges to accept their mistakes and remedy it urgently. That is what we urge the apex court to do and not to ever make such mistake again.”
Also, the former governorship candidate of the party in Anambra State in 2017, Mr. Oseloka Obaze, said the judges are not infallible, and should be able to accept their mistakes.
“The only thing that is impossible is to live forever. The judges who passed this judgment are not infallible, and the thing (judgment) they did is not right so they must find the courage to reverse themselves.”
Members of the party, who dressed in black attires and numbering over 3,000, carried placards with different inscriptions while protesting against the Supreme Court recent judgment.
Addressing a press conference at the party’s secretariat in Jalingo yesterday, the chairman of the party in the state, Victor Bala-Kona, who was accompanied by the Speaker of the state House of Assembly, Hon. Joseph Albasu Kunini, alleged that the Supreme Court manufactured votes for Uzodinma, the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Rejecting the judgment in its entirety, the party condemned what it described as “utter desecration” of the tenets and values of the judiciary, alleging that the Supreme Court manufactured and donated votes to the APC’s candidate against the mandate freely given to Ihedioha by the people of Imo State.
Describing the judgment as a calculated injustice, the party alleged that the decision of the Supreme Court on Imo State gubernatorial election has proven that the judiciary under the current Chief Justice of Nigeria was no longer the last hope of the common man, but rather the lost hope of the common man in Nigeria.
The party maintained that if the removal of Ihedioha by the Supreme Court is left unchallenged, it may signal the end of democracy which PDP and its founding fathers fought to entrench.
