By Eke Ogbonnaya
The Supreme Court ruling last Friday in the suit between Uche Ogah and Okezie Ikpeazu which joined Alex Otti as a party has thrown up wide range of speculations and created tension in many quarters and among opinion moulders.
Actually, it is constitution that joinder can hardly be denied by any court of competent jurisdiction because Alex Otti is a necessary party to the suit.
It would also be recalled that Supreme Court gave him some days within which to file his briefs that would disclose his intention to be joined in the suit. It is however pertinent to know that the matter before the Supreme Court started before the court of First Instance (Federal High Court) as a pre-election matter which Otti was not privy to.
The matter at the Federal High Court deals with the defectiveness of Ikpeazu’s qualification to contest the 2014 governorship primaries held on December 8, 2014, which was a PDP affair and which Okezie Ikpeazu, because of the defectiveness of his tax papers, was not ab initio qualified to contest because he intentionally misinformed his party, the PDP, and INEC. It should be noted that the primaries took place many months before the 2015 general elections.
Recall that the defectiveness of Ikpeazu’s tax papers came to court on December 14, 2014 (six days after the Abia PDP primaries) first, at the Federal High Court, Umuahia and later on, transferred to the Federal High Court, Owerri and also at the Federal High Court, Abuja in January 2015. The party, PDP, was aware of the defectiveness of his tax papers because the Zonal Screening Committee for South East PDP held at Enugu which screened Okezie Ikpeazu, Uche Ogah, Emeka Wogu, Friday Nwosu, Okey Emuchay and Okezie Orji, all governorship aspirants from Abia State, took notice of the defectiveness of the Ikpeazu’s tax papers and subsequently disqualified him. But because of the impunity in the party, it was alleged that the then governor and the son smuggled the defective tax papers to INEC instead of that of Uchechukwu Ogah whose credentials and tax papers were in order.
Therefore, the Federal High Court, Abuja presided over by Justice Okon Abang was not the first to disqualify Okezie Ikpeazu on his tax papers because the PDP screening committee of South East zone had already disqualified him on the issue. What Justice Okon Abang did was to confirm what the PDP Zonal Committee in Enugu saw in respect of his deformed tax papers and disqualified him. This is also to inform some cabals in PDP that the era of impunity has gone. In this vein, the Supreme Court should see the necessity in upholding the ruling of the Federal High Court, Abuja presided over by Justice Okon Abang in disqualifying Ikpeazu and ordering for Uche Ogah be sworn in as governor.
The public should be informed of the suit in question, as the suit is all about misinformation in respect of non-payment of taxes which the federal and indeed all governments frown at in addition to lying on oath. The issue of defectiveness in his tax papers disqualified him from the PDP primaries and the main election. The seat should go to Ogah who should have been given the PDP ticket since it is the party that wins election and not individuals, according to several Supreme Court judgments; Kogi State being a typical example. The victory is PDP’s.
The argument that he who did not contest an election should not benefit from it has been countered by various Supreme Court rulings. It should be observed that the Supreme Court gave some clarifications on the matter, where it (the Supreme Court) said that it was only for election matters proper and not pre-election matters. On the Cross River matter where Governor Ayade’s case of lying on oath was dismissed by the Supreme Court, we must be aware that Ayade’s age is not in contest because he is 48 or 47 (born on 1968 or 1969) as the case maybe is still above the constitutional age of contesting the governorship election which the Constitution has put at 35 years.
Finally, on Alex Otti, his joinder came at the wrong time; a time it was not supposed to be in the court. He should have allowed the present suit between Ogah and Ikpeazu to be resolved before going to challenge the outcome.
Therefore, Otti’s suit is not ripe to be heard; it is dead on arrival.
.Ogbonnaya is the chairman of Abia Republican Initiative, a pro-democracy outfit based in Umuahia.