Appeal court recognises Bashiru Bolarinwa as Kwara APC chairman

Party’s senatorial candidate, Eze, sacked in Enugu
Court of Appeal sitting in Ilorin, Kwara State, yesterday upturned the ruling of the state’s high court that pronounced Ishola Balogun-Fulani as the chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the state.

It, however, recognised Bashiru Bolarinwa as the authentic chairman.

The three-man panel said the high court ruling was built on nothing, as the court lacked jurisdiction to hear the Balogun-Fulani case challenging his dismissal as the APC chairman.

Having last week ruled in an interlocutory appeal that the court lacked jurisdiction to hear the case, the appeal court allowed the APC’s main appeal but dismissed the ‘sister appeal’ by Bolarinwa because it amounted to “mere academic exercise”.

The court said it would amount to a waste of time ruling on the Bolarinwa appeal, since the issues in it were similar to the ones in the main appeal filed by the Adams Oshiomhole-led National Working Committee (NWC) of the APC.

Bolarinwa is a co-applicant in the appeal filed by the APC NWC.

However, the appeal court struck out all the orders earlier granted by the lower court because the court lacked jurisdiction to issue such reliefs.

The appellate court held that the high court had acted in error in hearing it ab initio. It affirmed Bolarinwa as the authentic chairman of the party in the state, upholding the position of the APC NWC, which had expelled Balogun-Fulani and members of his executive committee from the party.

This judgment came exactly one week after the appeal court, in an interlocutory appeal, upheld the nomination of AbdulRahman AbdulRazaq as Kwara APC governorship candidate.

Meanwhile, Rafiu Ajakaye, the media aide to AbdulRasak, has described the judgment as well-couched and a tool for democratic growth.

Similarly, the Federal High Court sitting in Enugu has sacked the APC candidate for Enugu East senatorial zone, Lawrence Eze.

Eze’s sack came less than three weeks after an Abuja high court nullified the primary that produced the party’s gubernatorial candidate in the state, Sen. Ayogu Eze.

The Enugu court presided over by Justice Ibrahim Buba recognised Mrs. Adaku Ogbu-Aguoch as the validly nominated candidate of the party.

He, therefore, ordered that Mrs. Ogbu-Aguocha be recognised by the APC and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) as the rightful candidate for Saturday’s election.

Counsel to the defendant, Ferdinand Ukwueze, told journalists that his client would appeal the judgement.