Certificates of Return: Chris Uba, others storm Abuja today

Top-notch chieftain of the People’s Democratic Par­ty (PDP) in Anambra State, Chief Chris Uba, yester­day served notice that he would be leading other members of the party who emerged as candidates under the Chief Ejike Oguebe­go-monitored National Assem­bly primaries to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) Abuja, today, to demand their certificates of return.

But while Chris Uba pre­pares his storm troopers, INEC has warned it would not rush into withdrawal of the certifi­cates of return which it had ear­lier issued to Andy Uba and Stel­la Oduah or issue fresh ones to Chris Uba, Annie Okonkwo and Prince John Emeka as well as the House of Representatives mem­bers that were involved in the Su­preme Court judgement.

INEC Deputy Director of Publicity, Nick Dazang, told The AUTHORITY yesterday that the commission would first study and analyse the judgement be­fore it would take any action, not­ing that it can only take a decision after the commission’s legal de­partment must have completed its study of the judgements.

These developments come almost 72 hours after a 5-mem­ber panel of the Supreme Court recognised the leadership of Chief Ejike Oguebego’s faction of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in Anambra State, effec­tively unhorsing Senators Andy Uba, Stella Oduah and others from the National Assembly; the judgment is raising more dust and pitting members of the Uba family against one another.

The apex bench in its judg­ment on the leadership crisis in the Anambra chapter of the par­ty, last Friday, specifically pro­nounced the Chief Oguebego-led exco as the authentic leader of the political party in the state with the rights and powers to submit list of candidates for po­litical offices in the state to the Independent National Elector­al Commission (INEC).

But in a spirited fight-back, Senators Andy Uba, Stella Odu­ah and others whose election into the National Assembly collapsed last Friday, with the nullification of the leadership of their factional leader, are insisting that they are still the representatives of the af­fected Anambra senatorial zones in the National Assembly.

Responding, however, to their position yesterday, a key member of the Ejike Oguebego faction of the People’s Democrat­ic Party in Anambra State, Chief Chris Uba, issued a stern warn­ing to his brother, Senator Andy Uba, Ms. Stella Oduah and oth­ers to stop deluding themselves, saying they ceased to be senators of the Federal Republic of Nige­ria since last Friday.

Uba, while arguing that the judgment of the Supreme Court on Friday which affirmed an ear­lier High Court verdict recognis­ing the Oguebego exco as the state’s authentic leadership, ad­vised the affected ‘former’ sen­ators and House of Represent­atives members to accept their fate and honourably step down.

According to him, the Su­preme Court is the highest court of law in Nigeria and that their case is not only bad but irre­deemable.

Chris Uba, however, has stated he led other members of the party who emerged as can­didates under the Oguebego-monitored primaries to INEC, today, to demand their certifi­cates of return.

But the duo of Andy Uba and Oduah, still kicking, faulted the assumptions that the Supreme Court judgment effectively re­moved them from office, arguing that they were not a party in the suit which basically had to deal with issues of leadership crisis in Anambra PDP.

They, however, refused to mention that they were benefi­ciaries of the illegal faction which sponsored them for election to the National Assembly.

Chris, who described him­self as “Senator representing Anambra South” while speak­ing with reporters in Abuja, yes­terday, said he was shocked that those who should be conversant with the laws of the land could be deceiving the public regard­ing their true status after the Su­preme Court failed to recognise the dubious way through which they got to the Senate.

According to him: “The time for substitution had passed and we were busy doing our cam­paigns when, one week to the election, the Andy Uba faction went to the Court of Appeal and set aside the judgement of the High Court. Based on that, they took the judgment to INEC and their names were used to substi­tute our own.

“We cried foul then, insisting we were not party to the suit but INEC insisted that our names were initially published based on an earlier court order and that we should go on appeal.

“We appealed to the Supreme Court and the verdict on Friday clearly vindicated our position as the Supreme Court set aside that judgement of the Court of Appeal, agreed with the judge­ment of the High Court and even granted all our five prayers.

“Now, they (Chris Uba and Oduah) went on the air and is­sued press statements to deceive the public that the order from the Supreme Court did not af­fect them because they were not a party to the suit.

“The question is: when our names were removed by INEC and replaced with theirs, were we party to the suit?

“Now, they are shouting and trying to misinterpret a clear judgment that has removed them and given us victory.

“They are just deceiving the public. We will demand for our certificates of return from INEC on Monday because the judg­ment is clear.

“We do not need to seek for any further clarifications.”

Speaking further, Uba not­ed that, “When the whole exer­cise wanted to start, INEC wrote a letter to the PDP headquarters to avoid confusion, telling the PDP that the Ejike Oguebego exco was the one that it would recognise based on court order of a Federal High Court in Abuja.

“Unfortunately, the PDP ig­nored that letter and instead set up a two-man caretaker commit­tee to come to Anambra State to conduct primaries.

“Of course, there was no room for that caretaker com­mittee to operate in the state be­cause the key to conducting the primaries is the 3-man delegate from the 326 wards in the state.

“It was obvious that with­out the state exco, the caretaker committee cannot be function­al because the people who are supposed to organise the state congress were expected to liaise with the state chairman.

“From there, they would set up a committee to go to all the wards where the delegates would emerge from for electing candi­dates into the National and state assemblies.

“So, when they set up this caretaker, the Ejike Oguebe­go exco went to court and got a judgement recognising it as the right exco, therefore making null and void the caretaker commit­tee.

“The judgment also instruct­ed INEC and the PDP to conduct all the electioneering exercise under the Ejike Oguebego exco including all the candidates who were participating.

“So, we obeyed the court or­der and did our primaries as in­structed. The exercise was duly monitored by INEC and all the relevant papers were signed,” he added.

He said it would amount to injustice if the court had ruled in favour of the other group com­prising of Andy Uba, Stella Odu­ah and others who allegedly did not undergo any primaries nor even visited Anambra.”

Meanwhile, INEC Depu­ty Director of Publicity, Nick Dazang, who regretted that the courts have not been able to submit certified copies of their judgement to the commission for actions to follow, noted that such delays have continued to af­fect the functions of INEC either in the fixing of dates for election re-run of issuance or withdraw­al of Certificate of returns.

According to Dazang: “As at today, we have not received the Certified True Copy of the judgement. It is only when we receive it that we will study it and see what it says and take a de­cision where it concerns us and move on from there.

“I have called the director of legal services and he has main­tained that the certified copies of these judgements have not reached the commission.

“We have not fixed any date for the Anambra Central re-run before this new judgement came, with the latest judgement, it is a bit difficult to take a decision for now until our legal team goes through the documents.”