The Supreme Court today fixed February 7, 2015 date to deliver judgement in an appeal filed by Rivers State Governor, Hon. Chibuike Amaechi against moves by his political rival and predecessor, Chief Celestine Omehia to unseat him.<\/p>\n
And in what appeared a tightening of the noose around Amaechi’s political neck, the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) today joined forces with Omehia. The party\u00a0 urged the apex\u00a0 court to dismiss Amaechi’s appeal on the dispute over his tenure.<\/p>\n
This move by PDP may not be unconnected with the war of attrition between Amaechi and the PDP leadership.<\/p>\n
Amaechi and a PDP chieftain in the state, Cyprian Chukwu, had appealed to the apex court to void the leave granted Omehia by the Court of Appeal, Abuja to appeal an earlier judgment of the Federal High Court, Abuja in respect of when former’s tenure ought to have ended.<\/p>\n
Chukwu had in 2010 approached the Federal High Court, Abuja to interprete a judgment, in 2007, by Supreme Court on when the 2011 governorship election should hold in the state.<\/p>\n
Justice Abdulkadir Abdul- Kafarati of the Federal High Court had ruled that by virtue of the Supreme Court’s judgment, Governor Amaechi’s first tenure ended on May 28, 2011, and not in October 2011.<\/p>\n
The judge opined that since the Supreme Court\u00a0 decided that it was PDP that won the election, which hasn’t been set aside, Amaechi’s tenure began to\u00a0 run on May 29, 2007, Omehia’s occupation of the office notwithstanding.<\/p>\n
A dissatisfied Amaechi had appealed Abdul-Kafarati’s judgment. Shortly after,\u00a0 Omehia, who was not a party in the suit at the trial court, applied to be made a party.<\/p>\n
Brushing aside protestations by Amaechi and Chukwu, the Court of Appeal granted Omehia’s prayer leading both men to take their appeal to the Supreme Court.<\/p>\n
Interestingly, PDP which had from the outset opposed Omehia’s quest to be made party in the case today made a volte face. Aligning with Omehia, PDP urged the apex court to dismiss the joint appeal by Amaechi and Chukwu.<\/p>\n
Lateef Fagbemi (SAN) and Rickey Tarfa (SAN), counsels to Amaechi and Chukwu respectively prayed the court to take notice of the volte face by counsel to PDP, Olusola Oke.<\/p>\n
They queried why Oke made such a volte face.<\/p>\n
Oke had\u00a0 urged the court to dismiss both appeals (Amaechi and Chukwu’s) and uphold the decision of the appellate court, which granted Omehia leave to appeal the judgment by Justice Abdul-Kafarati<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Supreme Court today fixed February 7, 2015 date to deliver judgement in an appeal filed by Rivers State Governor, Hon. Chibuike Amaechi against moves by his political rival and…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":19238,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-19237","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news"],"yoast_head":"\n