By Ruth Oginyi
Following last week ouster of Mr. Emeka Ihedioha as the governor of Imo State by the Supreme Court, members of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP ) in Ebonyi State on Monday staged a peaceful protest against the removal of the PDP candidate in the 2019 governorship election.
The protesters led by the National Vice Chairman of the party, South-East Zone, Chief Austin Umahi, moved with placards from the party’s office to Federal High Court along Enugu Abakaliki highway to register their displeasure with last week’s judgement.
The Supreme Court had in a judgement last week nullified the election victory of Governor Ihedioha of the PDP as the winner of the March 9, 2019 governorship election in the state, and declared the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Senator Hope Uzodinma as winner.
The party, however, gave the Supreme Court judges 24 hours to reverse the judgement, alleging that the ruling APC influenced the ruling in favour of their party.
The PDP Vice Chairman called on the registrar of the Federal High Court in the state to pass their message to the National judiciary, pointing out that it was dangerous for the judiciary to allow the nation’s democracy to fail.
Umahi said, “Something that is not reversible is death it is better to call the NJC, it is better to call the Supreme Court judges that passed a perverse judgment to reverse themselves within 24 hours failure to do that, Democracy, has been murdered. They will never have peace in their life.
“It is unfortunate that democracy has been murdered, it is unfortunate that under the watch of judiciary that democracy is murdered, our understanding is that judiciary is the last hope of the common man but today it is the lost hope of the common man.
“The judgment of Supreme Court is perversed and it must be reversed immediately for the oneness of this country, for the furtherance of Democracy they must reverse and reinstate the man elected by the Imolites that is Rt Hon. Emeka Ihedioha, and not the man who was brought in through the back door.”
“We are going to resist it with everything that we have, that judgment can’t stand.
“When judiciary is captured, we are finished in this country and from observations, you can see we have a compromised judiciary, there is no independence again, there is no rule of law in this country and where are we going as a country? This is more like banana republic.
“If the judiciary didn’t reverse themselves, heavenly God will intervene and there is going to be calamity”, Umahi stated
On his part, the State PDP chairman, Mr. Onyekachi Nwebonyi, while calling on the international community and Nigerians to resist the outcome of the Supreme Court judgement, noted that the reasons advanced for the sacking of Ihedioha was baseless and unfounded.
“As a lawyer and even the layman will agree with me that the court of law can’t admit evidence that come from unlawful custody. A situation where somebody will seat in the comfort of his bedroom and write a result to represent INEC result and such result was not tendered by INEC become questionably.
“The question is this, who tendered those results at the Supreme Court? Those witnesses that tendered the result are they the proper witnesses?
“Under APC led federal government, the judiciary has been compromised. The judiciary supposed to be the last hope of the common man but in Nigeria today, judiciary is the lost hope of the common man.
“I have never seen this type of baseless judgement, unfounded judgement, even year one university students will agree with me that it is a baseless judgement.
“I want to use this medium to call on the international community and all well-meaning Nigerians to resist this abomination”, Ebonyi PDP chairman added.
