Mahmood Yakubu, chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), has said that he is not in contempt of any court judgment.
Reacting to a statement by Chekwas Okorie, the founder and pioneer chairman of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA), calling on President Bola Tinubu, and attorney-general of the federation to advise INEC and its chairman to obey a supreme court judgement on the APGA leadership crisis, Rotimi Oyekanmi, chief press secretary to Yakubu, denied that his principal is in contempt of any court order.
Insisting that the INEC chairman has been found guilty of contempt of court orders by an FCT high court, Okorie described as “futile,” Oyekanmi’s efforts to absolve Yakubu of contempt.
“The dilemma of Mr. Oyekanmi is understandable. It is usually a herculean task to successfully defend the indefensible. It is only Joseph Goebbels, Adolf Hitler’s propaganda minister who was reputed to be good at such things,” Okorie said in a statement on Monday.
“The Appeal suit no. CA/ABJ/CV/724/2023 has Chief Victor Ike Oye as the sole appellant with Otunba Kamaru Lateef Ogidan, Alh. Rabiu Mustapha and INEC as 1st, 2nd, and 3rd respondents, respectively. Prof Mahmood Yakubu did not appeal the contempt judgment against him.
“Oyekanmi needs to be educated that the contempt committal process is on individuals not on institutions, which usually commences with the issuance of forms 48 & 49 by a court of competent jurisdiction upon the filing of a motion for committal by an aggrieved party. This due process was followed diligently, and Mahmood was personally served.”
Okorie also insisted that the INEC chairman had taken sides in the APGA leadership crisis.
“It is now public knowledge that Mahmood is scandalously partisan in the matter of the APGA leadership dispute, but the fact remains that he is a contemnor since his name is not synonymous with Oye and can not hide under the cover of Oye to claim that he is a party to the pending appeal suit under reference. I have no personal interest in Prof Mahmood Yakubu’s impending jail,” he added.
The founder of APGA advised the INEC chairman to “avail himself of the Supreme Court judgment of Friday, 26/01/2024, where the apex court affirmed the decision of the lower courts, which imprisoned the immediate past Director General of the Bureau of Public Enterprises, Alexander Okoh. That case is on all fours with Prof Mahmood Yakubu’s impending imprisonment”.
“In the lead judgment, Hon. Justice Tijani Abubakar JSC tongue-lashed the BPE and Okoh for disobeying several orders issued on the matter, describing their actions as “scandalously shameful and disgraceful.”
I advise Prof Mahmood Yakubu to purge himself of contempt of court orders without further delay and follow it up with unreserved apologies to Chief Edozie Njoku and APGA.”
Elendureports sought clarification on the issue of his purported expulsion by APGA some years ago as claimed by one Ejimofor Okpara.
Okorie said, “I led APGA NWC to the courts to challenge the political coup in the party led by our then National Treasurer, Victor Umeh, who by the provisions of the Party constitution, was not in the line of succession under any supervening circumstances.”
“We approached the courts when the presidency under Chief Olusegun Obasanjo pressured INEC to recognize Victor Umeh as National Chairman, which was not possible except there was a validly convened National Convention of the Party to elect him into office.
“We were the plaintiffs in all the litigations. The defendants at no time filed a counter affidavit praying for my expulsion, and we could not have prayed for my own expulsion, so the issue of expulsion never arose at any of the courts.
“There was no judgment at any level of the courts that pronounced Victor Umeh National Chairman of APGA or declared me expelled. They are challenged to counter this assertion with evidence.
“There is no way I would be expelled from the Party I founded without it being reported by at least one of Nigerian news outlets, including social media.
“I kept custody of the APGA certificate of registration until 2012 when I resigned from APGA and voluntarily returned the certificate to INEC with a forwarding letter.
“It was the same year that I founded the United Progressives Party, UPP. Google will bear me out for anybody who cares to verify the facts.
“The details of these and other events are well documented in the book APGA AND THE IGBO QUESTION written by me.
“Nobody has countered the veracity of the accounts contained in the book since its public presentation in April 2022.
“Ironically, all those who decimated APGA have abandoned the party and decamped to other parties shamelessly, and we have returned to assist Chief Edozie Njoku and his colleagues to resuscitate the Party and repair the damage they inflicted on it.”
