Court affirms Emenike as Abia APC’s governorship candidate

Justice Kate C. Ogbonnaya of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) High Court, Kubwa in Abuja, yesterday, affirmed Chief Ikechi Emenike as the Abia State governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

Justice Ogbonnaya also ordered the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to recognise Emenike as the rightful candidate.
Emenike was declared winner of the APC governorship primaries held on September 30 by the Dr. Emmanuel Ndukwe’s faction of state’s APC.
Chief Returning Officer, Prof. Okezie Abariukwu, announced in Umuahia that Emenike received a total of 274,133 votes to defeat other six contenders in the primary election.

His name was, however, omitted from the party’s National Working Committee (NWC) list of candidates forwarded to the INEC.
Consequently, Emenike approached the court to seek for redress.

Emenike had earlier assured his supporters that the controversy trailing the primary in the state would be resolved in his favour either by the court of law or by the party’s leadership.  He had described the list of candidates forwarded to the INEC by the NWC as Adams Oshiomhole’s “private list” that would not stand the test of the law.

He stated: “I believe strongly that that list is, perhaps at best, Oshiomhole’s ‘private list,’ which he used his office to forward to INEC. And I am reassuring the vast supporters of the APC that it will not be the final list at the end of the day,” adding: “Ultimately, we have to wait to see how it pans out.

“A lot of us who are governorship candidates are in court and as long as Nigeria is a country governed by the rule of law and practices constitutional democracy, the antics of one man cannot prevail. “So, I believe quite frankly that the list is not going to be final. We are hopeful that at the end of the day, justice will prevail,” he stated.