Nigeria News
Appeal Court returns Umeh as APGA chairman
The Nigerian Court of Appeal sitting in eastern Nigerian city of Enugu on Monday nullified an Enugu High Court judgement removing Chief Victor Umeh as the National Chairman of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA).
In a unanimous decision, the appellate court quashed the judgment by Justice Innocent Umezulike, the state’s Chief Judge, which he granted in favour of one Jude Okuli, nullifying the 10 February 2011 APGA convention.
The convention produced Umeh and other members of the party’s National Working Committee (NWC).
Delivering the lead judgment, Justice Tom Yakubu overruled all the grounds of the preliminary objection filed by the respondent.
Victor Umeh
According to Yakubu, the lower court has no jurisdiction over the matter as the respondent has no locus standi to sue.
“It is not the duty of the court to scout for evidence to aid the case of the plaintiff. It is not the duty of the court to arrogate jurisdiction to itself,’’ he said.
The judge said the appeal filed by Umeh did not constitute an abuse of court process as the respondent claimed.
“The claim of the plaintiff was not against APGA but Umeh as he was not the alter ego of APGA,’’ Yakubu said.
The judge also said the lower court dissipated its energy in considering his locus standi and added that it was not the duty of the lower court to scout for evidence to aid the case of the plaintiff.
“By the statement of claim, the respondent could be best presumed to be an ordinary member and not a member of the National Working Committee (NWC),” he said.
On the issue of nullification of the convention, Yakubu noted that the trial judge over shot his mark when he declared the convention of APGA as unconstitutional, null and void.
The judge described Okuli as `a busy body,’ meddlesome person who lacked the locus standi to institute the case in the lower court yet the trial judge assumed the jurisdiction which he did not have.
Concurring with the lead judgement, the Chairman of the panel, Justice Paul Galinge, reiterated that if a court was not competent to hear a matter, it was a waste of time to hear and determine the matter.
“A court should not award that which was not claimed in pleadings by parties. A court is not a charitable organisation. This order was made without jurisdiction. The order is a nullity,’’ he said.
Galinje announced that the third judge in the panel, Justice Modupe Kwasami, who was unavoidably absent, also agreed with the lead judgement.
In his reaction, Umeh thanked the chairmen of the party in the various states and the NWC for their support, assuring them that it would bounce back and win the governorship election in Anambra.
He urged the aggrieved members to join hands with him so that the party would find a credible candidate to replace Gov. Peter Obi.
Also speaking, the respondent, Okuli, expressed disappointment with the judgement and said he would seek advice from the leaders of the party on the next step.
Mixed reactions trailed the judgement.
Some of the politicians who spoke with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Awka soon after the judgment, hailed the judgement while other said it had caused more confusion.
Chief Mike Kwentoh of Umeh’s faction described the judgement as a “triumph over illegality”.
Kwentoh said the judiciary had once again displayed that it was the last hope of common man in the society.
He urged the party faithful not to lose sight of the ultimate goal of APGA which was to ensure good governance.
On his part, Chief Ifeanyi Udokwu, a member of the party, said the judgement was “good and objective,” adding that it was the Umeh group that was recognised by INEC
In his reaction Chief Egwuoyibo Okoye of Maxi Okwu’s faction said the judgment had created confusion in the leadership of the party and showed “the level of hopelessness in the judiciary”.
“A few weeks ago, we celebrated when a the Court of Appeal in Enugu dismissed a suit against the election of Maxi Okwu and I, and today, the same court validates the leadership of Victor Umeh.
“Now that there are two judicially backed-up factions in the leadership of the party, INEC and the State Independent Electoral Commission (ANSIEC) are at liberty to obey whichever faction they deem fit.
“The implication, however, is that there are two authentic chairmen of APGA in Anambra. The two factions are at equilibrium with each enjoying the endorsement of the court,” he said.
In the same vein, a gubernatorial aspirant on the platform of APGA, Chief Patrick Obianwu, said the leadership of the party should exercise caution not to ruin it but employ dialogue to resolve the crisis.
“My opinion is that dialogue should be used as the best means of resolving the impasse. Above other things, the party leaders must see the interest of the party as paramount in all they do”, Obianwu said.
In his reaction, the Special Adviser to Gov. Peter Obi on Political Matters, Mr Felix Okafor, said the judgment created a parallel function which would be determined by the Supreme Court.
Meanwhile, Umeh on Monday dedicated his victory at the Court of Appeal in Enugu to the late Leader of APGA, Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu.
Addressing newsmen at Ojukwu’s cenotaph in Nnewi after singing praises to the late Ikemba, Umeh said the victory was a new dawn for APGA.
——————————————————————————————————————————————-
Posted in Nigeria News. A DisNaija.Com network.
Source: PM News
DisNaija.Com publishes regular posts on Nigeria News, Nigerian Newspapers, Online Nigeria Gist.
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The Kano State Government on Saturday said it has transferred 1,098 ‘almajiris’ to different states of the country.
The commissioner for local government, Murtala Garo, disclosed this while presenting a report before the state’s task force on COVID-19 at the government house, Kano.
Almajiris are children who are supposed to be learning Islamic studies while living with their Islamic teachers. Majority of them, however, end up begging on the streets of Northern Nigeria. They constitute a large number of Nigeria’s over 10 million out-of-school children.
Mr Garo said the Kano government transported 419 almajiris to Katsina, 524 to Jigawa and 155 to Kaduna. He said all of them tested negative for coronavirus before leaving the Kano State.
Despite the coronavirus test done in Kano for the almajiris, the Jigawa government earlier said it would quarantine for two weeks all the almajiris that recently arrived from Kano.
Mr Garo said another 100 almajiris scheduled to be taken to Bauchi State also tested negative to COVID-19.
In a remark, Governor Abdullahi Ganduje said the COVID-19 situation in Kano was getting worse. He appealed for a collaborative effort to curtail the spread of the virus in the state.
Mr Ganduje, who commended residents for complying with the lockdown imposed in the state, said the decision was taken to halt the spread of the virus.
Kano State, as of Saturday night, has 77 coronavirus cases, according to the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control.
The decision to transfer the Kano almajiris is part of the agreement reached between Northern governors that almajiris in each state be transferred to their states of origin.
However, even before the latest agreement by the governors, the Kano government had been transferring almajiris to other states and neighbouring countries after it banned street begging in the state, most populous in Northern Nigeria.
Despite the transfers, however, no concrete step has been taken to ensure such children do not return to Kano streets as there is freedom of movement across Nigeria although interstate travel was recently banned to check the spread of the coronavirus.
Sourced From: Premium Times Nigeria
By Ugochukwu Alaribe
Operatives of the Abia State Vigilante Service, AVS, popularly known as ‘Bakassi Boys’ have arrested 24 market women hidden in a container truck, at Ekwereazu Ngwa, the boundary community between Abia and Akwa Ibom states.
The market women, said to be from Akwa Ibom State, were on their way to Aba, when they were arrested with the truck driver and two of his conductors for violating the lockdown order by the state government.
Driver of the truck, Moses Asuquo, claimed he was going to Aba to purchase stock fish, but decided to assist the market women, because they were stranded.
A vigilante source told Sunday Vanguard that the vehicle was impounded while the market women were sent back to Akwa Ibom State.
Commissioner for Home Land Security, Prince Dan Okoli, who confirmed the incident, said that smuggling of people into the state poses great threat to the state government’s efforts to contain the spread of COVID- 19.
Sourced From: Vanguard News
Operatives of the State Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department (SCIID), Yaba of the Lagos State police command have arrested one Mrs Nene Steve for allegedly killing her maid, Joy Adole
The maid was allegedly beaten to death by Nene for requesting for her salary at their residence located at 18, Ogundola Street, Bariga area in Lagos.
Narrating the incident, Philips Ejeh, an elder brother to the deceased said that he was sad when they informed him that his sister was beaten to death.
He explained that the deceased was an indigene of Benue State brought to Lagos through an agent and started working with her as a maid in January 2020.
‘’She reported that her boss refused to pay her and anytime she asked for her salary she will start beating her.
She was making an attempt to leave the place but due to the total lockdown she remained there until Sunday when her boss said she caught her stealing noodles and this led to her serious beating and death,’’ Ejeh said.
He called on Lagos State Government and well- meaning people in the country to help them in getting justice for the victim.
The police spokesman, Bala Elkana, stated that the woman and her husband came to Bariga Police Station to a report that their house girl had committed suicide.
Detectives were said to have visited the house and suspected foul play with the position of the rope and bruises all over the body which confirmed that the girl had been tortured to death and the boss decided to hang up the girl to make it look like suicide.
He said: “The police moved on with their investigation and found a lot of sign of violence on her body that she has been tortured before a rope was put on her neck.’’
He added that the police removed the corpse and deposited it in the mortuary for autopsy to further ascertain the cause of the death.
Elkana said the matter has been transferred from Bariga police station to Panti for further investigation while the couple have been arrested and will be charged to court.
Ostensibly alarmed by the latest killings of dozens of soldiers by Boko Haram insurgents, President Muhammadu Buhari has summoned an urgent meeting of Service Chiefs to find ways to stop the trend.
He has also dispatched the Minister of Defence, Mansur Dan Ali, to the neighbouring Republic of Chad for an urgent meeting with President Idris Deby and his defence counterpart.
Knowledgeable sources said in Abuja on Friday that the president is worried by on the deterioration of security situation on the Nigeria – Chad Border that has led to the recently increased Boko Haram terrorism in the area.
The sources which did not want to be named in Abuja said: “Nigeria has a Chad problem in the Multi-National Joint Task Force (MNJTF) put together to secure the Lake Chad basin areas and repeal the Boko Haram terrorist attacks against all the countries neighbouring the Lake.”
The sources noted that Chad is believed to be having their own internal security challenges and this has reportedly led to their pulling away their own troops manning their own border around Lake Chad, saying: “That lacuna is being exploited by the Boko Haram terrorists, who go in and out of Nigeria, Niger and Cameroon to launch terrorist acts. This is a clear illustration of the fact that terrorism is beyond national borders.”
When contacted, the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, confirmed that the Defence Minister is going to Chad but said he is unaware of the purpose.
Meanwhile, the military authorities are said to be in the process of identifying the families of the latest victims with a view to making contact with them.
Credible sources revealed that it is the reason the president is yet to make any pronouncement on the matter.
“The President has called an urgent meeting with the Service Chiefs, as well as the fact that families of the latest victims of the Boko Haram are being identified and contacts made before a government pronouncement on the tragic attacks. This, it is understood, is the reason for the silence of the government over the incident,” the source said.
Sourced From: Tribune
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Nigeria News
Appeal Court returns Umeh as APGA chairman
The Nigerian Court of Appeal sitting in eastern Nigerian city of Enugu on Monday nullified an Enugu High Court judgement removing Chief Victor Umeh as the National Chairman of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA).
In a unanimous decision, the appellate court quashed the judgment by Justice Innocent Umezulike, the state’s Chief Judge, which he granted in favour of one Jude Okuli, nullifying the 10 February 2011 APGA convention.
The convention produced Umeh and other members of the party’s National Working Committee (NWC).
Delivering the lead judgment, Justice Tom Yakubu overruled all the grounds of the preliminary objection filed by the respondent.
Victor Umeh
According to Yakubu, the lower court has no jurisdiction over the matter as the respondent has no locus standi to sue.
“It is not the duty of the court to scout for evidence to aid the case of the plaintiff. It is not the duty of the court to arrogate jurisdiction to itself,’’ he said.
The judge said the appeal filed by Umeh did not constitute an abuse of court process as the respondent claimed.
“The claim of the plaintiff was not against APGA but Umeh as he was not the alter ego of APGA,’’ Yakubu said.
The judge also said the lower court dissipated its energy in considering his locus standi and added that it was not the duty of the lower court to scout for evidence to aid the case of the plaintiff.
“By the statement of claim, the respondent could be best presumed to be an ordinary member and not a member of the National Working Committee (NWC),” he said.
On the issue of nullification of the convention, Yakubu noted that the trial judge over shot his mark when he declared the convention of APGA as unconstitutional, null and void.
The judge described Okuli as `a busy body,’ meddlesome person who lacked the locus standi to institute the case in the lower court yet the trial judge assumed the jurisdiction which he did not have.
Concurring with the lead judgement, the Chairman of the panel, Justice Paul Galinge, reiterated that if a court was not competent to hear a matter, it was a waste of time to hear and determine the matter.
“A court should not award that which was not claimed in pleadings by parties. A court is not a charitable organisation. This order was made without jurisdiction. The order is a nullity,’’ he said.
Galinje announced that the third judge in the panel, Justice Modupe Kwasami, who was unavoidably absent, also agreed with the lead judgement.
In his reaction, Umeh thanked the chairmen of the party in the various states and the NWC for their support, assuring them that it would bounce back and win the governorship election in Anambra.
He urged the aggrieved members to join hands with him so that the party would find a credible candidate to replace Gov. Peter Obi.
Also speaking, the respondent, Okuli, expressed disappointment with the judgement and said he would seek advice from the leaders of the party on the next step.
Mixed reactions trailed the judgement.
Some of the politicians who spoke with the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Awka soon after the judgment, hailed the judgement while other said it had caused more confusion.
Chief Mike Kwentoh of Umeh’s faction described the judgement as a “triumph over illegality”.
Kwentoh said the judiciary had once again displayed that it was the last hope of common man in the society.
He urged the party faithful not to lose sight of the ultimate goal of APGA which was to ensure good governance.
On his part, Chief Ifeanyi Udokwu, a member of the party, said the judgement was “good and objective,” adding that it was the Umeh group that was recognised by INEC
In his reaction Chief Egwuoyibo Okoye of Maxi Okwu’s faction said the judgment had created confusion in the leadership of the party and showed “the level of hopelessness in the judiciary”.
“A few weeks ago, we celebrated when a the Court of Appeal in Enugu dismissed a suit against the election of Maxi Okwu and I, and today, the same court validates the leadership of Victor Umeh.
“Now that there are two judicially backed-up factions in the leadership of the party, INEC and the State Independent Electoral Commission (ANSIEC) are at liberty to obey whichever faction they deem fit.
“The implication, however, is that there are two authentic chairmen of APGA in Anambra. The two factions are at equilibrium with each enjoying the endorsement of the court,” he said.
In the same vein, a gubernatorial aspirant on the platform of APGA, Chief Patrick Obianwu, said the leadership of the party should exercise caution not to ruin it but employ dialogue to resolve the crisis.
“My opinion is that dialogue should be used as the best means of resolving the impasse. Above other things, the party leaders must see the interest of the party as paramount in all they do”, Obianwu said.
In his reaction, the Special Adviser to Gov. Peter Obi on Political Matters, Mr Felix Okafor, said the judgment created a parallel function which would be determined by the Supreme Court.
Meanwhile, Umeh on Monday dedicated his victory at the Court of Appeal in Enugu to the late Leader of APGA, Dim Chukwuemeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu.
Addressing newsmen at Ojukwu’s cenotaph in Nnewi after singing praises to the late Ikemba, Umeh said the victory was a new dawn for APGA.
——————————————————————————————————————————————-
Posted in Nigeria News. A DisNaija.Com network.
Source: PM News
DisNaija.Com publishes regular posts on Nigeria News, Nigerian Newspapers, Online Nigeria Gist.
Follow us on Twitter and Facebook.
Nigeria News
Follow @Dis_Naija
Your Opinion Counts. Be sure To Leave A Comment, If You Have Any.
Please Like, Share or Tweet. Your Support Is Appreciated.
The Kano State Government on Saturday said it has transferred 1,098 ‘almajiris’ to different states of the country.
The commissioner for local government, Murtala Garo, disclosed this while presenting a report before the state’s task force on COVID-19 at the government house, Kano.
Almajiris are children who are supposed to be learning Islamic studies while living with their Islamic teachers. Majority of them, however, end up begging on the streets of Northern Nigeria. They constitute a large number of Nigeria’s over 10 million out-of-school children.
Mr Garo said the Kano government transported 419 almajiris to Katsina, 524 to Jigawa and 155 to Kaduna. He said all of them tested negative for coronavirus before leaving the Kano State.
Despite the coronavirus test done in Kano for the almajiris, the Jigawa government earlier said it would quarantine for two weeks all the almajiris that recently arrived from Kano.
Mr Garo said another 100 almajiris scheduled to be taken to Bauchi State also tested negative to COVID-19.
In a remark, Governor Abdullahi Ganduje said the COVID-19 situation in Kano was getting worse. He appealed for a collaborative effort to curtail the spread of the virus in the state.
Mr Ganduje, who commended residents for complying with the lockdown imposed in the state, said the decision was taken to halt the spread of the virus.
Kano State, as of Saturday night, has 77 coronavirus cases, according to the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control.
The decision to transfer the Kano almajiris is part of the agreement reached between Northern governors that almajiris in each state be transferred to their states of origin.
However, even before the latest agreement by the governors, the Kano government had been transferring almajiris to other states and neighbouring countries after it banned street begging in the state, most populous in Northern Nigeria.
Despite the transfers, however, no concrete step has been taken to ensure such children do not return to Kano streets as there is freedom of movement across Nigeria although interstate travel was recently banned to check the spread of the coronavirus.
Sourced From: Premium Times Nigeria
By Ugochukwu Alaribe
Operatives of the Abia State Vigilante Service, AVS, popularly known as ‘Bakassi Boys’ have arrested 24 market women hidden in a container truck, at Ekwereazu Ngwa, the boundary community between Abia and Akwa Ibom states.
The market women, said to be from Akwa Ibom State, were on their way to Aba, when they were arrested with the truck driver and two of his conductors for violating the lockdown order by the state government.
Driver of the truck, Moses Asuquo, claimed he was going to Aba to purchase stock fish, but decided to assist the market women, because they were stranded.
A vigilante source told Sunday Vanguard that the vehicle was impounded while the market women were sent back to Akwa Ibom State.
Commissioner for Home Land Security, Prince Dan Okoli, who confirmed the incident, said that smuggling of people into the state poses great threat to the state government’s efforts to contain the spread of COVID- 19.
Sourced From: Vanguard News
Operatives of the State Criminal Investigation and Intelligence Department (SCIID), Yaba of the Lagos State police command have arrested one Mrs Nene Steve for allegedly killing her maid, Joy Adole
The maid was allegedly beaten to death by Nene for requesting for her salary at their residence located at 18, Ogundola Street, Bariga area in Lagos.
Narrating the incident, Philips Ejeh, an elder brother to the deceased said that he was sad when they informed him that his sister was beaten to death.
He explained that the deceased was an indigene of Benue State brought to Lagos through an agent and started working with her as a maid in January 2020.
‘’She reported that her boss refused to pay her and anytime she asked for her salary she will start beating her.
She was making an attempt to leave the place but due to the total lockdown she remained there until Sunday when her boss said she caught her stealing noodles and this led to her serious beating and death,’’ Ejeh said.
He called on Lagos State Government and well- meaning people in the country to help them in getting justice for the victim.
The police spokesman, Bala Elkana, stated that the woman and her husband came to Bariga Police Station to a report that their house girl had committed suicide.
Detectives were said to have visited the house and suspected foul play with the position of the rope and bruises all over the body which confirmed that the girl had been tortured to death and the boss decided to hang up the girl to make it look like suicide.
He said: “The police moved on with their investigation and found a lot of sign of violence on her body that she has been tortured before a rope was put on her neck.’’
He added that the police removed the corpse and deposited it in the mortuary for autopsy to further ascertain the cause of the death.
Elkana said the matter has been transferred from Bariga police station to Panti for further investigation while the couple have been arrested and will be charged to court.
Ostensibly alarmed by the latest killings of dozens of soldiers by Boko Haram insurgents, President Muhammadu Buhari has summoned an urgent meeting of Service Chiefs to find ways to stop the trend.
He has also dispatched the Minister of Defence, Mansur Dan Ali, to the neighbouring Republic of Chad for an urgent meeting with President Idris Deby and his defence counterpart.
Knowledgeable sources said in Abuja on Friday that the president is worried by on the deterioration of security situation on the Nigeria – Chad Border that has led to the recently increased Boko Haram terrorism in the area.
The sources which did not want to be named in Abuja said: “Nigeria has a Chad problem in the Multi-National Joint Task Force (MNJTF) put together to secure the Lake Chad basin areas and repeal the Boko Haram terrorist attacks against all the countries neighbouring the Lake.”
The sources noted that Chad is believed to be having their own internal security challenges and this has reportedly led to their pulling away their own troops manning their own border around Lake Chad, saying: “That lacuna is being exploited by the Boko Haram terrorists, who go in and out of Nigeria, Niger and Cameroon to launch terrorist acts. This is a clear illustration of the fact that terrorism is beyond national borders.”
When contacted, the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, confirmed that the Defence Minister is going to Chad but said he is unaware of the purpose.
Meanwhile, the military authorities are said to be in the process of identifying the families of the latest victims with a view to making contact with them.
Credible sources revealed that it is the reason the president is yet to make any pronouncement on the matter.
“The President has called an urgent meeting with the Service Chiefs, as well as the fact that families of the latest victims of the Boko Haram are being identified and contacts made before a government pronouncement on the tragic attacks. This, it is understood, is the reason for the silence of the government over the incident,” the source said.
Sourced From: Tribune
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