Akwa Ibom: A/ Court reserves its decision in the APC gubernatorial election dispute between Udofia and Enang”

The All Progressives Congress’ (APC) disqualified Akwa Ibom governorship candidate Akanimo Udofia appealed a lower court’s decision, and the Court of Appeal in Abuja has deferred judgement.

The three-member panel, presided over by Justice Elfreda Williams-Dawodu, announced this after the appellant’s counsel, Damian Dodo, SAN, and Sen. Ita Enang’s attorney, Mba Ukweni, SAN, adopted their submissions and provided their arguments for and against the appeal.

The Federal High Court (FHC) in Uyo, according to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), had revoked Mr. Udofia’s candidature as the APC’s candidate for governor of Akwa Ibom on November 14.

The judge, Agatha Okeke, mandated that the APC hold a new governorship primary within two weeks, but she disallowed Udofia from taking part in it.

Mr. Enang, a former presidential assistant who campaigned for office in the primary, brought the action.

Enang had pleaded with the court to recognise him as the party’s legitimately elected candidate, noting that Udofia was not a party member at the time of the primary.

But Udofia had appealed the FHC ruling, with the filing number CS/C/370/2022.

The first respondent in the appeal is Enang. The second is the APC, and the third is the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
Enang, Udofia, and INEC are the first through third respondents, respectively, in another appeal submitted by the APC through its attorney, J.Y. Musa, SAN, on the same topic and marked: CS/C/371/2022.

Dodo said that the appellant’s brief, which was filed on December 9 and had that date as its date of filing, was brought up during Udofia’s appeal hearing on Saturday, when it started again.

He agreed with all of his legal arguments and asked the court to change the decision of the lower court.

The attorney argued that the lower court erred in its decision because the litigation, which was brought about by an originating summons, should have been brought about by a writ of summons. He based this claim on an appeals court decision that was upheld by the Supreme Court on October 21.

He claimed that the supreme court had ruled that whenever parties are at odds, particularly in pre-election matters, a writ of summons should be filed so that parties could call witnesses and the court could render an objective judgement because it would be difficult for a court to find two parties who could agree on a fact.

He said that Enang, the first respondent, should have used a writ of summons to file the lawsuit in the current case, where it was said that votes were given to certain people and that the results were faked.
Dodo also said that Enang’s amended originating summons wasn’t sent to the lower court until 14 days after the legal deadline.

He claims that the lower court’s decision to base its decision on the revised originating summons turned that decision into an incurable disease that affected the entire case, making the lower court’s judgement that was based on the amended originating summons completely invalid.

In addition, he claimed that Enang’s brief to the appeals court was submitted after the five-day deadline.

In order to recognise and publish Udofia (appellant) as the APC candidate for the 2023 Akwa Ibom governorship election, he urged the court to uphold their appeal.

However, Ukweni, who represented Enang, objected to Dodo’s submission.

The argument was that Enang had five days to file his brief at Appeal Court, but the lawyer said that the record of appeals showed that Enang was served on December 12 in Calabar open court.

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He went on to say that Enang, the first respondent, did not get the appeal record and notice of appeal until December 12, even though the appellant gave them an appeal brief on December 9.

He stated that their Dec. 14-dated brief had been submitted on Dec. 16.
Therefore, he asserted, “It is not correct that we filed our brief after the deadline.” To support his claim, he cited a 2006 Court of Appeal judgement involving the Justice Party and INEC.

Ukweni says that the court decided that the respondent would have a certain amount of time to file a brief after all parties had seen the whole record in that case.

He insisted that the respondent was indeed served with all the records in this particular appeal on December 12th, 2022, in open court.

The lawyer read from his brief of contention, which said that FHC does not have to be served outside of Nigeria if the process is to be served in Nigeria.

He requested that the court reject Udofia’s appeal.
In response to the appellant’s reply brief, Ukweni said that Enang’s modified originating summons at FHC was filed after the trial judge’s August 24 deadline of 14 days.

The lawyer said that the court’s decision to change the original summons was legal and was a decision made by the court.

He added that Udofia has 14 days from the court’s delivery on August 24 to file a challenge to the judgement.

So, he explained, “to argue that they are now challenging the judgement on the grounds that it was founded on an altered originating summons is an indirect means to seek your lordship’s extension of time to appeal against that decision of August 24, 2022.”

He requested that the appeal’s concerns and grounds be dismissed in this case.

The senior lawyer said that they can’t come in through the back door to fight the court’s decision because it is sacred.

Ukweni, who disagreed with Dodo on bringing the lower court lawsuit using an originating summons rather than a writ of summons, claimed that Justice John Tsoho, the Chief Judge of the FHC, issued a practise directive for a rapid trial of cases involving upcoming elections.

He stated that Justice Tsoho directed that pre-election actions be initiated by issuing summonses based on the expediency granted to him as Chief Justice.

He continued, “And we started the suit by issuing summons.”
He stated that the facts of the case were different from the sources that Dodo had quoted.

“There were concerns with certificate fraud in that instance, but we are not amending certificate fraud.”

We say that the appellant, Udofia, is a PDP member who ran in the party’s primary election on May 25, 2022.
“How did you become a candidate for the APC on May 26, 2022?
“The straightforward case that was brought before the lower court and is now before your lordship on appeal was that,” the man said.

Ukweni said that Udofia told the lower court on May 1 that he had joined the APC.

The trial judge remarked, “Assuming we followed your argument that you joined the APC on May 1, but the register of party members as required by the Electoral Act was submitted to INEC on April 14. ” So how could you have passed through the process of nomination even if you joined a party on May 1st?” he questioned.

He informed the court that their brief included a ballot from the PDP primary that was held on May 25 and had Udofia’s picture on it.

The lawyer said that the appeal didn’t make sense and asked the court to throw it out.

According to NAN, neither the second (APC) nor the third (INEC) respondents submitted a brief in the appeal.

Also, after Udofia filed an appeal, Ukweni asked the court to throw out APC’s appeal because it was unnecessary.

He urged the court to reject the complaint and uphold the lower court’s ruling ordering the holding of a new election for party members, asking “Why would you (APC) complain for another person?”

Justice Williams-Dawodu said that the case would end on January 22 and put off making a decision.

She promised to inform the parties of the judgement date.

(NAN)(