Ihedioha: PDP petitions U.S. UK, insists on reversal of Supreme Court judgment

National Chairman of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Prince Uche Secondus (fourth left), leading other stalwarts of the party in protest over the Supreme Court judgment on Imo State governorship election at the U.S. Embassy in Abuja…yesterday PHOTO: NAN

TRACKING____The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) yesterday stormed the embassy of the United States of America and the United Kingdom High Commission in Abuja to protest what it called perversion of justice in Nigeria.

The protesters comprised national leaders of the PDP led by the party’s National Chairman, Prince Uche Secondus.They submitted a petition titled ‘Perversion of Justice: Deliberate Efforts At Truncating Democracy in Nigeria’ to the two embassies.

In the petition, they drew the attention of the two countries to what they called “a serious case of judicial compromise and deliberate perversion of justice by the Supreme Court of Nigeria, which is now threatening our democracy as well as the peace, stability and corporate existence of our dear nation.”

Narrating how the Supreme Court allegedly subverted the course of justice and sacked former Imo State governor, Emeka Ihedioha, the PDP leaders noted that “this perversion of justice has already sparked off protests in various parts of our country and has become a clear threat to peace, unity and stability of our nation and the survival of our democracy.”

They called on the U.S. and the international community to take more than a passing glance to the issue in order to avoid an imminent breakdown of law and order in the country.

They also demanded the immediate resignation of Justice Tanko Mohammed as Chief Justice of the Federation (CJN) and chairman of the National Judicial Council, claiming that Nigerians had lost confidence in him and a Supreme Court under his leadership.

The petition further stated: “ln the light of extraordinary circumstances that vitiate that judgment as a product of manipulation and a clear coup against the will of the people of Imo State, we demand that the decision of the Supreme Court on the Imo Governorship Election be reviewed and reversed in the interest of justice.

“Anything short than this is a direct invitation to anarchy, chaos and a huge threat to our democracy and the corporate existence of our nation.“We rejected the judgment with clear call for a judicial review and ultimate reversal of the judgment by the Supreme Court. Nigerians had been at a shock over the voiding of the lawful election of Hon. Emeka Ihedioha, who scored 276,404 votes and awarding fictitious votes to declare Hope Uzodimma of the APC, who scored 96, 458 votes as governor of Imo State.

“In order to achieve this, the Supreme Court, on its own, declared additional votes (beyond the official number of accredited voters) from purported 388 polling units not certified by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and donated same to the APC and its candidate to declare them winner.”

The PDP leaders said, “the action of the Justice Tanko-led Supreme Court raises very serious issues, which point only to a deliberate miscarriage of justice against our party and our democratic order by the Supreme Court.”

“The Supreme Court, in a host of cases, the latest and most celebrated being Atiku V Buhari & Ors, consistently decided that for a petitioner to succeed in an allegation of infraction of any provision of the Electoral Act especially one complaining about malpractice, as in this case, wrongful exclusion of votes, the petitioner must call witnesses polling unit by polling unit. However, in this case, the same Supreme Court was not presented any witnesses from Uzodinma/APC from the fictitious 388 polling units from where the court allocated votes to him. Does the Supreme Court have powers to formulate and allocate votes as election results?” it queried.

The PDP leaders added: “What is more perplexing is the fact that INEC produced a schedule of reasons why results were not produced from the 388 units. Indeed, election did not even take place in most of the units for one reason or another, like violence among others and so no result could possibly be obtained from those units. The results were not merely rejected or cancelled by INEC. Moreover, nobody is aware of the number of votes scored by each party from the said 388 polling units. The Tribunal or Court of Appeal did not mention or ascribe any figure from the units to any party in their decisions.

“In fact, during the cross examination of the APC Candidate, Sen. Hope Uzodinma, he could not read any figure from the said results. He said that the figures were not clear. It therefore beats the imagination where the Supreme Court conjured and manufactured the figures it used in declaring Uzodinma/APC as duly elected?”