IMO GUBER OVERSHADOWED BY UNRESOLVED PAST

 Kingdom Nwokeocha argues why many people are not excited about the forthcoming election in the state

This week, Imo will join two other states, Bayelsa and Kogi, to hold an off- cycle governorship election. Whereas the circumstances that brought Bayelsa and Kogi to join the league of states whose governorship elections hold off season are hardly unusual, that of Imo is peculiarly unfamiliar. The state was visited with the most unusual when the Supreme Court, on January 14, 2020, removed the governor of the state and installed another in circumstances that were unknown to electoral jurisprudence in Nigeria. The judgment was a rude shock to everything that was usual. It got tongues wagging. The propriety of the judgment was called to question.

Since the judgment was given, legal luminaries are still sharply divided over the sense and nonsense of the legal drama. Whenever issues that border on electoral litigations come up, Imo is usually singled out as a subject of unedifying banters. The joke around the judgment has remained odd ever since. Given this unflattering scenario, it would have been interesting to see how the imposition of 14th January, 2020 would be dismantled on November 11 via the ballots. But that is hardly the case in Imo. The people of Bayelsa and Kogi may be excited over the prospect of an election that will usher in a new leadership in their states. But not so with Imo State. The people are not excited about the coming election. They see it as ill-conceived and premature. Their state, they argue, is not yet ripe for a new election given the fact that issues around the earlier governorship election held on March 9, 2019 are yet to be resolved.

It should be noted that the Supreme Court which disrupted the electoral calendar of Imo State through the controversial judgment of January 14, 2020 had earlier, on December 20, 2019 adjudicated on the same subject matter but failed, most regrettably, to give effect to its judgment. The issue here is that the supreme court ruled on December 20, 2019 that one of the candidates in the March 9, 2019 governorship election, Mr Uche Nwosu, violated the constitution and the electoral law for holding the gubernatorial tickets of two political parties in that election. Nwosu was the candidate of both the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the Action Alliance (AA). By that act, neither him nor the political parties that sponsored him qualified to participate in that election. The meaning of this was that Nwosu’s participation in the election under reference was null and void. It also meant that the parties- APC and AA- whose tickets he held did not take part in the election.

But what spoiled the broth was that the Supreme Court contradicted itself a few weeks after. Rather than give effect to its judgment that disqualified APC and AA and their candidate, by making a definitive pronouncement on who the candidates for that election were and who won the election, the court side-stepped that judgment and entered a fresh one that assigned a candidate to APC. The court did not just assign a candidate to APC, it went further to declare that candidate the winner of the election. By its action, the court wittingly reprobated and approbated. In one breath, it said APC had no candidate and did not participate in the election. In another, it assigned APC a candidate and awarded it victory. This contradiction is what Imo has been dealing with since four years. The same contradiction has been haunting the apex court. The people of the state and all men and women who care about democracy and rule of law are insisting that the right thing should be done on the Imo governorship case. That is why the people are not excited about a new election in the state. How can they be when there is a subsisting issue around an earlier election that needs to be settled?

Significantly, the Supreme Court which caused the confusion has provided a window of opportunity. It appears set to put right what it left hanging. For nearly four years, it left Imo in the cold. The imposed candidate who became governor in a most unusual circumstance has had a field day. The experiment he embarked upon without being sure it would yield results has paid him handsomely. He has been governor for almost an entire tenure, a prospect he never imagined. You could, if you like, say that he has had his day. But because humans have a way of aspiring even beyond their imagination, the accidental governor of January 14 has thrown his hat in the ring for a second term contest. An election to that effect is expected to take place this week. But that is beside the point. Truth is, the election of November 11 can wait. But since it cannot because it is almost here, its outcome, whatever it may be, must be seen to be of less consequence than the resolution of issues around the 2019 governorship election.

The real issue at moment is that the Supreme Court, after a near four-year lethargy, has decided to take its judgment of December 20 to a logical conclusion. It has fixed the 5th day of December 2023 for an appeal lodged on the matter by the Peoples Democratic Party and the Action Peoples Party. The parties are asking the supreme court to give effect to its declaration that “a political party is not capable of sponsoring two candidates for the same office in the same election”. The logical consequence of this is that the APC and the AA did not field any candidate in the 9 March governorship election in Imo State. It further means that it was wrong for the court to have returned the APC which fielded no candidate as the winner of that election.

This is the task before the Supreme Court. This task borders on integrity. It also has so much to do with the future of legal practice in the country. Since courts rely so much on decided cases, the Supreme Court, the highest court in the land, must be mindful of judgments passed by it . It must shun judgments and decisions that will bring it to disrepute. What is considered wrong in the eyes of the law today will still appear wrong in centuries to come no matter the cloak with which it is wrapped. The Supreme Court of Nigeria has a historical responsibility to resolve the Imo governorship tussle on the side of the law. Let justice prevail, regardless of whose ox is gored.

Nwokeocha is of the Neo Africana Media Centre