Oshiomhole’s Suspension Still Stands, Lawyers Insist
POLITICS DIGEST – Lawyers have said that the Kano Federal High Court ruling setting aside the ruling of the FCT High Court which suspended national chairman of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Adams Oshiomhole, from office cannot stand.
Ebun-Olu Adegboruwa (SAN), a Lagos-based legal practitioner and human rights activist, cautioned judges to be careful not to subject themselves to public ridicule over the pronouncements they make, especially as regards political matters.
Adegboruwa, while reacting to the ruling by the Federal High Court in Kano said courts of coordinate jurisdiction issuing inconsistent orders on the same subject matter is worrisome.
The presiding judge of the Federal High Court in Kano, Justice Lewis Allagoa, ordered that the status quo ante bellum be maintained, pending the hearing of the motion on notice by the applicant, Aliyu Muhammad Rabiu.
Justice Danlami Senchi of the FCT High Court had on Wednesday granted an order of interim injunction stopping Oshiomhole from parading himself as the APC national chairman.
Reacting to the judgment, Adegboruwa said: “I just believe that the judiciary needs to tread cautiously in respect of political matters because of the wrong impression that it is creating in the minds of the general public: when you approach a court, you can get an injunction in one day.
“You can file an appeal and the appeal can be heard in one day; when we lawyers who come to court know that, ordinarily, it takes two weeks before you even assign a case, and for an appeal to be heard can take up to two months in ordinary cases.
“So, I believe that courts of coordinate jurisdiction issuing different and inconsistent orders in respect of the same subject matter are opening up the judiciary to ridicule and it should be avoided.
“I have not seen the details of these orders but if it is true that one court restrained him and another reinstates him in respect of the same case, it is quite worrisome.
“Our judges must be very careful not to expose themselves to undue public ridicule.”
Also, Monday Ubani, immediate past second national vice president of Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), has described the judgment of the Kano High Court as an absurdity.
Ubani maintained that only an appellate court could set aside the order of the Abuja High Court. He stressed that the order from the Kano High Court should be ignored as it lacked merit.
“The Kano High Court order cannot stand. It is an absurdity. Only an appellate court can set aside the order of the Abuja High Court. They should ignore the useless order of the Kano High Court,” he said.
Similarly, Justice Uhuegbu, lawyer and activist, argued that the Abuja High Court judgment suspending Oshiomhole was still valid, stressing that only the appeal court could set aside the judgment.
Uhuegbu, who is the national president, Association for Good Governance (AFGG) maintained that when two equities meet, the law prevails and when two laws meet, the first in time prevails.
He pointed out that since the Abuja High Court was the first to make an order in the same matter, its judgment must prevail over the judgment of the Kano High Court.
Uhuegbu said that since the judgment was given by a court of competent jurisdiction, the Kano High Court had erred by making a judgment in the same matter.
“This is what I will call bastardising the judicial process. How can a high court give an order and another high court will give a counter order on the same matter?
“The only court that can set aside what the Abuja High Court has done is the appeal court,” he said.
The lawyer said Oshiomhole was only wasting his time approaching what he called a kangaroo court for a mission impossible.
Furthermore, the former president of Igbo think-tank, Aka Ikenga, Chief Goddy Uwazurike, said the whole process could be described as judicial rascality.
He said: “Speaking from the law perspective, there was no ruling in Kano and, as far as I am concerned, no practising judge will sit on such matter without having a file of the proceedings.”
Uwazurike added that Oshiomhole erred by taking the matter to a Kano court.
“Oshiomhole ought to have filed an appeal where he resides in Abuja instead of Kano, where there is no jurisdiction to get a court order.
“However, if the Kano ruling is actually true, I believe the National Judicial Council (NJC) of old that I know will step in and retire the judge that sat on such matter,” he said.
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Moreover, the national president of the Committee for the Defence of Human Rights (CDHR), Malachy Ugwummadu, said the order obtained by the embattled APC chair was incomprehensible from the angle of the law.
“It is incomprehensive in the sense that the court of such jurisdiction will overrule the ruling of another court,” he said.
He added that there were two conflicting statements pertaining to the order, because Oshiomhole had also filed an appeal on the same order.
Malachy raised the following question: “When was the Kano State application filed and what is the nature of the affidavit filed before the court?”
While noting that the above question was an administrative issue, he added that it was inconceivable that the ruling of a court could be overruled by another court of coordinate jurisdiction.
“The move by Oshiomhole simply shows that the other party can also run to Owerri or any other state to get another order,” he said.
On his part, Comrade Salihu Mustapha, APC Vice Chairman (North East), chided the suspended national chairman of the APC, Oshiomhole, for procuring an unenforceable ex parte order from a court of coordinate jurisdiction.
Mustapha said the APC National Working Committee was investigating who released a purported list of NWC members allegedly made by the party on January 14, 2020.
Reacting to the Kano High Court judgment reinstating Oshiomhole on Thursday, Mustapha, whose application for an interim injunction led to Oshiomhole’s suspension by an FCT court, said the suspended chairman was trying to be smart by half.
He said it was too obvious to even non legal minds that a Federal High Court cannot vacate an order made by a state High Court, both of equal or coordinate jurisdiction.
“First of all, I want to be very brief because we have a case in court and I am a plaintiff in this matter, so I don’t want to say what may be sub judicial to the case.
“But I want to tell you from my knowledge of law that two courts of coordinate jurisdiction cannot sit on appeal on an order or judgment given by each other.
“A Federal High Court cannot sit on appeal on a case before the FCT High Court. The only court that has the jurisdiction to sit on an appeal is the Court of Appeal in this case, and the order of the FCT High Court was served yesterday.
“Most of you have the copy of the order and it is an elementary law that first in time prevails. That of Abuja High Court came earlier.
“So, if you look at the main reason why that interlocutory order was granted, I don’t think that a Federal High Court of the same jurisdiction will now come and set it aside.
“We don’t need the knowledge of law to know that a high court cannot sit on a matter of appeal in a high court.
“So, I don’t want to say much about the order but I want to say that it is only the Court of Appeal that can vacate this injunction.”
Mustapha, therefore, maintained that Oshiomhole remained suspended until the appellate court adjudicated on the matter.
“As you can see, we are in the secretariat and we are running the affairs of the party. So, the suspension still prevails until the hearing of the matter, or if there is any contrary order from the Court of Appeal.”
On the late announcement on Wednesday by the party of new members of the NWC, he said the party was investigating the source of that statement and vowed criminal prosecution of whoever issued the statement.
He maintained that no replacement for those positions had been made by the NWC and told Nigerians to discountenance the misinformation.
According to him the last meeting of the NWC on the subject-matter was inconclusive while the name of Ajimobi, former governor of Oyo State, was just submitted in February from his zone.
He wondered when the NWC met over the list before giving its approval.
On the list he said: “That’s laughable, because that one is what amuses me most, and it is very pathetic and disturbing because we saw an announcement that purported that we approved nominations of three officers on the 14th of January.
“One of these officers, which is the deputy chairman, South, even the nomination from his state came to the national vice chairman on the 28 of February, almost 40 days after the date of the purported meeting.
“The meeting we had on the 14th January, I came out of the meeting and I told you guys that the meeting was stopped because they were trying to do illegality on the national secretary, the matter of the other people was referred to the zone, nobody discussed it.”
He said the NWC was investigating the whole saga and discussing with lawyers to see if any criminal liability was involved, as he vowed to get to the root of the matter.