Like an obstinate fly which follows the corpse to the grave, Chief Andy Uba, former aide to ex-President Olusegun Obasanjo, penultimate Thursday, made yet another desperate attempt to get the Supreme Court to rescind its earlier judgment, which threw him out of the Government House, Awka. The fresh suit requested the apex court to remove Dr. Peter Obi of All Progressive Grand Alliance, APGA, as Governor of Anambra State and replace him with Uba.
In the suit, Uba and PDP are challenging the refusal of the Enugu Division of the Court of Appeal to set aside an alleged faulty notice of appeal which formed the foundation of the Supreme Court judgment that nullified the conduct of the Governorship election in Anambra on 14 April 2007. The apex court held then that Obi’s tenure was subsisting and would terminate in March 2010.
It would be recalled that Uba and PDP last year filed an application to the Supreme Court asking it to set aside its judgment which annulled the April 2007 governorship election in Anambra State won by Uba. However, the Supreme Court dismissed Uba’s application. Ordinarily, that would have marked the end of the judicial assault on Obi’s governorship in Anambra, but that would be underestimating Uba’s desperation.
Hearing into the matter commenced at about 9:00 am but was soon aborted when the court, presided over by Justice Niki Tobi, discovered that the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, was not served with processes in the matter, which led to its not being represented at the proceedings. The failure on the part of the former presidential aide and his party to serve the electoral body, which they named as one of the parties in the suit–2nd Defendants–meant that the matter was not ripe for hearing and the court wasted no time in adjourning the matter. An ex-parte application filed by Uba’s counsel, Mr. Taiwo Abe, wherein he urged the court to hear Uba’s appeal urgently on the ground that Dr. Obi’s tenure will terminate in March 2010, failed to persuade the court to continue with the matter.
In the new notice of appeal to the Supreme Court, Uba and PDP said that the justices of the Court of Appeal were wrong to have refused his application on the ground that the Supreme Court had determined the case and that the principle of Stare Decisis precluded the appelate court, being a lower court, from inquiring into the case again. Governor Peter Obi through his counsel, Chief Onyechi Ikpeazu, a senior advocate, filed a preliminary objection to Andy Uba’s new suit, contending that the appeal is an abuse of court process. The matter will come up again for hearing on 17 February.
Report By Nnamdi Felix
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