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Tag: APGA

  • ‘Inspiring change for female politicians’

    ‘Inspiring change for female politicians’

    The theme for the celebration of this year’s International Women’s Day is Inspiring Change. Yetunde Oladeinde assesses the strides recorded as well as some of the challenges facing Nigerian women in politics.

    THE first International Women’s Day was held in 1911 and ever since the date has been significant for women all over the world. It is a day to celebrate achievements in the social, political and economic spheres while focusing world attention on areas requiring further action.

    At the moment, the 2015 election is around the corner and different interest groups are busy strategising to carve a niche for themselves. Nigerian women, interestingly, have for long been playing crucial roles in the political life of the country, and this has contributed in no small measure in shaping the political system of the nation.

    It is, therefore, pertinent to find out how women in politics can inspire change and increase the number of women in elective positions across the country. For Iyabo Anisulowo, “Women are more in politics now, unlike in those days. But there are also categories of women, some are just there to support the men; they sing and dance. While some are activists, agitating for political positions to pull their weight and show that they can also do what the men are doing.

    “But because of lack of enough education, the women have not been able to occupy some of these positions. We want more women to contest election, even if they are not going to win, at least people will know that we tried to wrestle power from the men. But we are improving now.”

    She added that “Politics is also very expensive to play and most women are poor. For instance, when we go for rallies, you have to pay for buses to convey your supporters, cook food, among other things. In developed countries, it is not like that. You can interact with your people through the use of technology. Women are not also violent in nature. Politics now involves thuggery and the usage of arms, and only a few women can withstand that.”

    It is also important to look at the women who have made a mark against the odds. One of such women is Chris Anyanwu, a politician and journalist, who has recorded a number of milestones. The achievements came with a number of obstacles like her incarceration during the Abacha regime. “I fully realise that my incarceration was a well-calculated plan by General Abacha and a certain misogynist clique in the ruling circle to force me out of the profession and by it send a strong signal to the female elite that there are limits for women in this society. The tragic demise of the only other female publisher and the gory murder of three outstanding and outspoken women in the country during this same period all fit into this pattern of behaviour,” she said.

    Abike Dabiri-Erewa, member of the Nigeria Federal House of Representatives representing Ikorodu Constituency in Lagos State, is another politician and journalist who has set a pace for many. In the House, Hon. Abike Dabiri-Erewa is distinguishing herself by working tirelessly as she sponsored a bill that would grant freedom to practice journalism after a certain qualification.

    Professor Dora Akunyili, former Director General of NAFDAC and politician, is another amazon that comes to mind. In year 2010, she resigned her appointment as the minister of information in the President Jonathan cabinet and decided to pick a senatorial form on the platform of APGA in Anambra State to contest for a seat in the upper federal legislative chamber in the 2011general elections. Unfortunately, she was not successful at the polls.

    During the 2011 presidential election, Sarah Jubril stood out as the only woman who challenged President Goodluck Jonathan and former Vice President Atiku Abubakar for the presidential flag of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party, PDP.

    And across the 63 political parties, she was the only woman who struggled to occupy the Aso Rock seat of power.

    According to Jubril, “Women had been grossly marginalised in the power-sharing arrangement, with no woman occupying the nation’s highest office since independence in 1960.And this is in spite of the fact that women account for about 51% of the voting population of the country. The highest office a woman has occupied is Speaker of the House of Representatives, which Hon. Patricia Etteh held for four months and 26 days between June and October 2007 before she was compelled to quit over alleged graft.”

    A veteran presidential aspirant of sorts and in her early 60s, Jubril’s presidential ambition dates back to 1992. She was an aspirant in the defunct Social Democratic Party, SDP, in the botched Third Republic. She also aspired in 1998 on the platform of the PDP and lost the presidential ticket to Gen. Olusegun Obasanjo, who went on to win the polls.

    Despite the difficulties faced by women in politics, they continue with their political ambition, contributing enormously to the political and national development in their own way as the challenges militating against them are not present, although Nigeria is yet to have a female president. Women over the years could be said to have recorded

    some measure of appreciable political achievement in other political fields of endeavours, meeting their political objectives with limited support and resources at their disposal.

    In 1957, during the pre-independence era of Nigeria, a couple of women political activists such as Mrs. Margaret Ekpo, Mrs. Janet Mokelu and Ms. Young were members of the Eastern House of Assembly. The late Mrs. Funmilayo Ransome-Kuti, though not a full-fledged politician, was a very strong force to reckon with in the politics of the Western Region.

    Hajia Gambo Sawaba also waged a fierce battle for the political and cultural emancipation of women in the north. One can say that women have always played viable political roles in Nigeria in spite of all the limitations and encumbrances. In addition, the Babangida era marked a turning point in the history of women struggle in Nigeria, when Maryam Babangida institutionalised the office of the first lady in 1987.

  • Tribunal refuses to strike out APGA

    Tribunal refuses to strike out APGA

    The Anambra State Elections Petitions Tribunal sitting in Awka yesterday refused to strike out the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) in the motion on notice filed by the party.

    But the tribunal struck out paragraphs in a petition filed by Senator Chris Ngige for additional witness.

    The Chairman, Justice Ishaq Bello, responding to the ruling read by Justice Akintola Akinniyi, said the tribunal would not shut out anybody.

    He said: “We want to allow parties to ventilate their minds,” adding that the tribunal had drawn the curtain on pre-hearing matters and would proceed to the main cases.

    Counsel to Dr. Chike Obidigbo, Maduabuchi Oba, told the tribunal that they were not seeking consolidation of the cases because their case was different from others.

    He said the petitioner, Obidigbo, contested and won the November 16 governorship election.

    Maduabuchi said they would call two witnesses, adding that they did not require the services of interpreters or experts.

    But Ken Mozie (SAN), counsel to Chief Willie Obiano; Chief Emeka Ngige (SAN), counsel to Senator Chris Ngige and D.C. Denwigwe (SAN), counsel to Tony Nwoye, told the tribunal they would invite experts.

    Also, Matthew Ugwuocha, counsel to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC); Ernest Nwoye, counsel to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Osita Nnadi (SAN), counsel to APGA, agreed to invite experts if there was need.

    Ngige said any document not front-loaded would be disputed during hearing.

    Justice Bello adjourned proceedings till today.

  • Alleged double registration: APGA applies to join suit against Obiano

    Alleged double registration: APGA applies to join suit against Obiano

    The All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) has applied to be made a party in a suit challenging the legitimacy of Willie Obiano as a candidate in the last governorship election in Anambra State.

    Obiano contested the November 16 poll on the platform of APGA and was declared winner by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).

    Counsel to APGA P. I. Ikwueto (SAN) told a Federal High Court in Abuja yesterday that the party filed a joinder application, seeking the court’s permission to be included in the suit.

    Plaintiffs’ lawyer Joe Gadzama (SAN) said he was not opposed to APGA being made a party, noting that it was Obiano’s platform and that the court could have added APGA.

    Obiano’s counsel Onyechi Ikpeazu (SAN) told the court that he was served with the application and needed time to respond.

    “In view of the factional issues going on in APGA, it is my duty to assess the situation and then oppose this application.

    “For this reason, I will urge this court to allow me the statutory period within which I will properly represent the interest of the first defendant (Obiano),” he said.

    INEC’s lawyer Ibrahim Bawa said he was not opposed to the application.

    Justice Ahmed Mohammed granted time to Ikpeazu to respond to APGA’s application and adjourned till March 10.

    The plaintiffs, Ugochukwu Ikegwuonu and Kenneth Moneke, asked the court to disqualify Obiano because he possessed two voter cards.

    Sued with Obiano is INEC, as the second defendant.

    The plaintiffs’ said the card Obiano tendered before he was cleared to participate in the party’s screening exercise was not the same as the one he submitted to INEC.

    They raised three questions for the court’s determination and sought five reliefs, including an order disqualifying Obiano from the election.

    They also sought an order of mandatory injunction compelling INEC to strike out Obiano’s name from its record as a candidate.

    The plaintiffs also asked the court to declare that Obiano was unqualified to contest the election because he allegedly possessed more than one card.

    Ikegwuonu and Moneke said the court should determine whether, by his alleged conduct, Obiano was qualified to contest by virtue of sections 12(2), 16(2)(3) and 31(5) of the Electoral Act.

    In a supporting affidavit, Ikegwuonu averred that Obiano allegedly possessed two cards – one purportedly obtained in Lagos, which he tendered at his party’s screening in August and another one claimed to have been obtained in Otuocha, Anambra State, on September 3, last year, which he allegedly presented to INEC.

    He said the Voter’s Identification Number on the first card is 90F5815E7D3738200332, while the second one is 90F5B12B01296204172.

    Ikegwuonu averred that Obiano’s claim to having a voter card, as contained in the documents submitted to INEC, was false.

    He queried the authenticity of the date contained on the birth certificate, which Obiano tendered and which was issued by Awka South Local Government.

  • Tribunal dismisses Obidigbo’s petition

    Tribunal dismisses Obidigbo’s petition

    •Strikes out major paragraphs in Nwoye’s petition The Anambra State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal in Awka has dismissed a petition filed by Dr. Chike Obidigbo, claiming to be the authentic candidate of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), in the November 16, 2013 governorship election. It described him as a stranger in the petition. Obidigbo filed a petition against Chief Willie Obiano, APGA’s candidate in the poll. He also sought to be joined in the petitions by the All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate, Senator Chris Ngige and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, Comrade Tony Nwoye. The ruling on the application was reserved for yesterday by the three-man tribunal led by Justice Ishaq Bello. In the ruling, which lasted over one hour, Justice Bello said Obidigbo could not be joined in the petition in the spirit of the Electoral Act. He said it was the tribunal’s view that the applicant was not known to be a party in the election and could not be joined in the petition. According to him, “the law does not provide for a ceremonial respondent in an election petition, as a party must be connected with the election. The applicant has a mistaken belief that he has a case. “The applicant is not found anywhere in the body of the petition. Continuing with the application will amount to dragging the tribunal into an intra-party dispute in which the tribunal has no jurisdiction.” The tribunal also ruled on the application by the counsel to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), brought to it by Ahmed Raji (SAN), for some paragraphs in the petition filed by the PDP candidate to be struck out on the grounds that they were irrelevant to the main petition. Among the paragraphs were the alleged multiple registrations by Obiano and non-qualification due to the alleged multiple registrations. There were also the allegation against security operatives and APGA officials accused of facilitating the victory of APGA and the allegation of criminality against some unnamed persons. In the ruling read by Justice Akintola Akinniyi, the tribunal observed that while it was not proper to strike out all the paragraphs as demanded by INEC’s counsel, there were some pre- election matters, which had no reason to remain in the petition. He said: “Even if the allegation of multiple registrations was proved, it was not one of the bases for the qualification of a candidate to stand for an election. “Double or multiple registrations is a criminal offence and there is no proof that Obiano has been sued and anybody, who has a case against him on that should file a case in court, which has to issue an order against him.” The tribunal ruled that the allegation of supplying false information to INEC was not enough to disqualify a candidate, saying there must be a court order disqualifying the candidate, which was not the case in the matter at hand. The tribunal said the Electoral Act, as amended, stipulated that it was the court that could entertain such a matter and that should have been done before the election was held. Justice Akinniyi also said the failure of the petitioner to name the agents accused of working for INEC, did a fatal blow to the petition.

  • ‘Anyanwu’s exit good riddance to bad rubbish’

    ‘Anyanwu’s exit good riddance to bad rubbish’

    The All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), Imo State chapter, dismissed yesterday as deceitful and ridiculous, the claim by the lawmaker representing Imo East, Senator Chris Anyanwu that she returned to the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) with 27 council party chairmen and 17 members of its state working committee.

    APGA’s Publicity Secretary, Mr. Tony Mgbeahuruike, said the senator left the party with only her campaign structure from the nine local governments in Owerri zone and not 27 local government party chairmen as she claimed during the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) rally organised to receive her and other returnees.

    Mgbeahuruike, who described her exit as good riddance to bad rubbish, said she did not add value to APGA while she was a member.

    He said: “It is fallacious for Senator Anyanwu to claim that she was compelled to quit APGA due to its crisis. The party is intact. APGA is the only democratic party in the country, which believes in the rule of law. APGA, Imo State branch, is intact. Why should a distinguished senator indulge in falsehood and deceit?”

    On whether the party would take a legal action against the lawmaker to reclaim the mandate given her, Mgbeahuruike said: “We are a law-abiding party. We believe in the rule of law. Her case will be handled in the same manner we handled that of Governor Rochas Okorocha. Although hers is worse than Okorocha’s.”

     

  • Anambra: INEC, Obiano, others reject ‘joinder’ motion

    The motion for joinder filed by Dr. Chike Obidigbo, a factional candidate of All Progressive Grand Alliance in the 2013 Anambra governorship election, was on Friday opposed by the counsel representing Chief Willie Obiano.

    The News Agency of Nigeria reports that the motion was also opposed by the Independent National Electoral Commission, Mr. Tony Nwoye, Sen. Chris Ngige and the Peoples Democratic Party at the Justice Ishaq Bello-led Election Petitions Tribunal sitting in Awka.

    Counsel to Obidigbo, Mr. Oba Maduabuchi, had sought to join the factional candidate as a respondent in the petitions as well as an order directing the respondents to serve him with processes.

    “We have sufficient interest in the petitions; we have by exhibits shown that the name of the applicant (Obidigbo) was submitted to INEC as a candidate in the election.

    “The exhibits are judgments recognising Chief Maxi Okwu as the national chairman of APGA who duly nominated Obidigbo as the candidate of the party.”

    In opposing the motion, however, counsel to Nwoye, Mr. George Igbokwe, told the tribunal that the application for joinder was self-defeating.

    “This application, if granted, will invariably result to an amendment of our petition by virtue of the Electoral Act, 2010.

    He contended that none of the exhibits presented by Maduabuchi declared Obidigbo as the winner of the said election.

    Also opposing the motion, the counsel to INEC, Mr. Mathew Ugwuocha, said the commission’s list of candidate for the poll clearly stated Obiano’s name as the APGA candidate.

    “As an umpire in the election, INEC has no dealing with the applicant; besides, form 001 was not submitted for or on behalf of the applicant in the election,” Ugwuocha argued.

     

     

  • Maku and the defections from PDP

    Maku and the defections from PDP

    Last Wednesday, Information Minister, Labaran Makun, launched a blistering attack on members of his ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) who defected recently to the new opposition All Progressives Congress (APC), an amalgam of the Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP), the Congress for Progressive Change (CPC) and a faction of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA).

    The defectors, the minister said, were “like the Fulani nomads; they move from one party to another without shame. It shouldn’t be something we should cherish.”

    The minister launched his rather gratuitous offensive during a news briefing in Abuja, the federal capital, on the outcome of the day’s Federal Executive Council meeting.

    In launching his attack on the defectors he singled out the governors of Kano State, Dr Rabi’u Kwankwaso, and his Sokoto counterpart, Alhaji Aliyu Wamakko. They were, he said, undemocratic desperados who parachuted themselves into the APC and hijacked it from its founders.

    Their defections, he said, were however good for the party; akin to an obese person shedding undesirable fat to live a healthier and more robust life. (I am not so sure it would be wise for PDP to be so smug as the youthful minister; between Kano and Sokoto states there are relatively nearly as many voters – over seven million – as the entire Southsouth put together, with their nearly nine million).

    Maku’s unflattering comparison of the defections with the nomadic lifestyle of Fulanis has been rightly condemned by many as ethnicist. However, I agree completely with the underlying assumption of his diatribe which is that any defection based on ego or personal ambition rather than on a sublime principle is a thing to be condemned.

    The trouble with Maku’s angry words, however, was that they were not based on any principle. Rather they were simply meant to please his political godfathers. Otherwise, it would have occurred to him before he spoke that his harsh words would be truer of former governor of Kano State, Malam Ibrahim Shekarau, and his Sokoto State counterpart, Alhaji Attahiru Dalhatu Bafarawa, who subsequently traded places with their successors by defecting to the PDP. This realisation would have advised him to have been more careful in his choice of words against Kwankwaso and Wamakko.

    Take Bafarawa first. Nearly twelve years ago, on March 28, 2002 to be precise, the former Sokoto governor, as guest speaker at the second anniversary of the founding of the Arewa Consultative Forum, had only harsh words to describe what he said was the marginalisation of the North by the PDP under former president, General Olusegun Obasanjo. “Ogun and Oyo alone,” he said, in the course of his lecture to the applause of his large audience, “have benefitted from over N30 billion worth of road projects, more than what 12 states that make up Northwest and Northeast together enjoyed.”

    His answer to this marginalisation, he said, was Northern unity, pointing out that “While the West is AD 100%, the South-south and the South-east are PDP 100% … the North is 50% APP and 50% PDP.”

    He concluded that it was therefore “imperative that, at least for the sake of future presidential elections, we must all go one direction…United we stand, divided we fall.”

    Without prejudice to the merit or otherwise of his preference for the politics of regional monolithism, a preference which lacks any basis in our political history because opposition forces had always thrived in the old regions, one must ask what has changed between now and when Obasanjo left office seven years ago to justify Bafarawa’s defection to the PDP. The truth, as Bafarawa knows all too well, is that the North has been marginalised even more under President Goodluck Jonathan’s PDP than under Obasanjo’s.

    Exactly eight years to the day he was guest speaker at the ACF’s second anniversary, he said in a lengthy interview in The Nation (March 28, 2010) that he would never join PDP because being in opposition was the only way to deepen democracy in Nigeria. This was after he left ANPP in frustration, following his accusation that PDP had planted Chief Donald Etiebet as ANPP’s chairman to serve as a fifth columnist.

    Instead of joining PDP, he said, he decided to form his own Democratic Peoples Party (DPP) on whose platform he eventually contested the 2011 presidential election. Naming then PDP chair, Dr. Ahmadu Ali, and then acting president, Goodluck Jonathan, as his witnesses, he claimed Obasanjo offered him the control of Sokoto, Kebbi and Zamfara states by ceding the nomination of their governorship candidates to him, if he would join PDP. He said he rejected the offer.

    The Nation: What is in PDP that is making you run away from it?

    Bafarawa: I don’t believe in joining PDP because I want to help democracy grow…When there is challenge in democracy, then the government will move but if there is no opposition, there is no democracy.”

    Makes you wonder, doesn’t it, what has changed about the PDP’s proverbial “garrison democracy” four years after the former Sokoto governor’s encounter with editors of The Nation that it has now suddenly become a beacon of democracy without the threat of a viable opposition party.

    Obviously, Bafarawa needs a better excuse than the ones he’s been giving us for his defection to a party that before now he had regarded as simply incapable of fostering democracy. And what is true of Bafarawa is even truer of the former Kano State governor, Malam Ibrahim Shekarau.

    Only late last year at a conference organised by the Movement for Better Future and Democratic Emancipation in Kaduna on September 7, 2013, he dismissed President Jonathan as a “total failure.”

    “My assessment,” he said then, “is that the government is a total failure… The only answer to this failure is to get the right people to do it.”

    Makes you wonder, doesn’t it, how within a short spell of five months the president has, in the former governor’s eyes, become the only right person to take Nigeria to now “do it.”

    For this intelligent and highly eloquent former teacher-turned-politician who, most Nigerians agreed, emerged the clear winner of the 2011 Presidential debate – what with, in the words of BBC News (April 5, 2011) “his eloquence, a calm disposition and an apparent grasp of policy issues” – to now sing praises of a president he thought unworthy of his office not too long ago, it speaks volumes about the courage and integrity of the self-declared convictions of our politicians.

    Of course, real elections are won not by debating skills alone. In free and fair elections that have defied this country, politicians win on the strength of their character and performance. The long history of carpet crossing between parties in this country and the manner in which our youthful minister of Information, Labaran Maku, heaped scorn on those who defected to the opposition party is proof positive that it would be a great miracle if next year’s election is, for once, won, not on the basis of propaganda, but on the basis of character and performance.

     

    Re: Babangida’s triumph of hope over reality

    Sir,

    So IBB does not as a Nigerian, a former president, war veteran, leader, elder statesman, etc, etc, have the right to say his mind and air his views on any national issue, without you attacking him.

    So Gen IBB is wrong and you are right. How selfish, self-centered and confused you are.

    Are you attacking IBB to please your pay masters or you have nothing to write or you want to be heard loud and clear because you attacked IBB?

    You (have) many issues to write about so why wait for IBB to speak, you then attack him? He has been very kind to you and your family. He does not deserve any attack from you on pages of newspapers, more so when you have direct access to him and can see him at any time you so wish.

    Who is sponsoring you against IBB? Who is afraid of IBB?

    Please have a re-think and kindly desist. IBB only said his mind, simple and clear and he has the right to.

    Hassan Muhammad Jallo.

     

    Sir,

    Does it matter if there are hitches in a society? And despite General Babangida’s optimism, yours was “pessimism” all through! Remember, you have benefitted from this same wobbled system and you are still benefitting. Give encouragement and support to our leaders rather than sanctions and ridicule!

    Lanre Oseni.

     

     

     

     

  • Reps oppose 2.3GHZ broadband spectrum auction

    Reps oppose 2.3GHZ broadband spectrum auction

    House of Representatives has decried the planned sale of 2.3GHZ broadband spectrum by the Nigeria Communications Commission (NCC).

    Its Committee on Communications has been mandated to review the pre-qualification criteria for companies wishing to participate in the proposed auction.

    The House also mandated the committee to look into future auctions of national telecommunications assets, with a view to including a requirement that interested companies be listed on the Nigerian Stock Exchange (SEC).

    The lawmakers’ decision followed the adoption of a motion by Chris Azubogu (APGA, Anambra), who said most companies, which indicated interest in the auction, cannot be subjected to certain rules.

    He said: “Most of the major players in the industry – MTN, Airtel, Etisalat and others, all of whom have indicated a desire to participate in the auction, are privately-owned companies, which are not subject to the corporate governance and full disclosure standards obligatory for publicly- listed companies.

    “It is absence of standards, which makes our prime national telecommunications assets to be transferred to companies without proper authentication of their financial status.

    “Auction of communications licences to unquoted companies is not in the public policy interest of the Nigerian state and it is dangerous to the well-being of the industry”.

    Major telecommunications companies, including MTN, Glo, Airtel, Zinox among others were reported to have bid for the 2.3GHZ broadband spectrum licence, following the announcement for the auction by NCC.

     

  • Akunyili’s, Umeh’s senatorial ambitions divide APGA

    Akunyili’s, Umeh’s senatorial ambitions divide APGA

    The senatorial ambitions of Chief Victor Umeh, the factional national chairman of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) and former minister of Information, Prof. Dora Akunyili, are tearing the party apart in Anambra State.

    Both are aspiring for the Anambra Central seat occupied by former Governor Senator Chris Ngige of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

    Prof. Akunyili contested the seat with Ngige in 2011 and was defeated.

    A meeting convened by a group, Anambra Central Political Forum (ACPF), with Chief Austine Ndigwe as the coordinator, ended in a controversy, as members walked out.

    Some of those not in favour of the choice of Umeh are Chief Ben Obi, the special adviser to Governor Obi on Inter-party Affairs and the Anaocha Local Government chairman, among others.

    While Obi and members of his group are rooting for Prof. Akunyili, Ndigwe and his group are supporting Umeh.

    A source close to the Government House, who pleaded anonymity, told The Nation yesterday that the governor was backing Prof. Akunyili.

    Some APGA faithful are against Umeh following his role in the last council poll.

    He was said to have allegedly dropped the names of the chairmanship candidates, who emerged during the primaries last year and replaced them with his candidates.

    The Nation learnt that this did not go down well with APGA bigwigs and they decided to thwart his ambition.

    With Umeh’s court battle against a factional National Chairman of the party, Chief Maxi Okwu, who was restored by a Federal High Court in Abuja, members are likely to dump him for Prof. Akunyili.

     

  • Tribunal: APGA stifles process with 500 witnesses

    Tribunal: APGA stifles process with 500 witnesses

    •16 SANs appear

    •PDP presents 126 witnesses, APC 100

    The pre-hearing of the Anambra State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal began yesterday in Awka, with 16 Senior Advocates of Nigeria (SANs) appearing.

    But the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) may be stifling the process by calling 500 witnesses.

    Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) is calling 126 witnesses, while the All Progressives Congress (APC) has 100.

    The parties are challenging the declaration of Chief Willie Obiano of APGA as winner of the November 16 poll by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).

    At the resumed hearing, four petitions challenging were mentioned; Dr. Chike Obidigbo’s against Obiano and two others; Senator Chris Ngige against INEC, Obiano, APGA and Advanced Congress of Democrats (ACD); PDP versus INEC and 25 others; and Tony Nwoye versus INEC and 25 others.

    Ngige’s lead counsel Mr. Oluwarotimi Akeredolu (SAN) said the petitioners withdrew the petition against ACD.

    “We have also filed a motion, asking the tribunal to direct preliminary points of law or objection to be taken with the final addresses of parties,” he said.

    Other SANs, who appeared at the tribunal and raised motions, were Patrick Ikwueto, representing APGA and Osita Nnadi.

    Others are Mr. Adegboyega Awomolo, Arthur Obi-Okafor for INEC, while Mr. Onyechi Ikpeazu appeared for Obiano.

    Akeredolu and Chief Emeka Ngige (SAN) appeared for APC, while Prof. F.C. Dike represented Dr. Chike Obidgbo, who is contesting the APGA ticket with Obiano.

    Chief A. O. Ajana (SAN) was for PDP, while Mr. Emmanuel Ukala (SAN) represented Mr. Tony Nwoye with D.C. De Nwigwe (SAN) and Ikechukwu Ezechukwu (SAN).

    Justice Ishaq Bello said with the number of lawyers, there should be a radical approach to the cases.

    He said the tribunal would allow more processes to be filed, while the possibility of consolidating motions would be looked into, to allow expeditious proceedings.

    One of Senator Ngige’s lawyers, Chief Ngige, said he was worried about the number of witnesses called by APGA, adding that it was a delay tactic, considering that the tribunal had 136 days to sit.

    After listening to the lawyers, Justice Bello adjourned proceedings till February 11.