Appeal Court judgment: Kwara PDP seeks NGF’s intervention

Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Kwara state has sought intervention of the Nigeria Governors’ Forum (NGF) in the crisis rocking the state House of Assembly over an Appeal Court’s judgement which affirmed the PDP’s Jimoh Agboola as the winner of the Ilorin South constituency’s elections.

The PDP appealed to NGF to compel the state governor, Abdulrahman Abdulrazaq, to follow democratic norms and values in resolving the imbroglio.

The leadeship of the state House of Assembly has allegedly refused to allow winner of the Court of Appeal judgement and the PDP lawmaker, Abdulraheem Agboola, into the Assembly for swearing-in and documentation since he got the judgement few days ago.

The appellate court had declared Agboola of the PDP as the winner of the Ilorin South constituency’s House of Assembly election in the last general elections and was subsequently issued a certificate of return by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).

Speaking with journalists in Ilorin at the weekend, the state chairman of the PDP, Engineer Kola Shittu, described alleged refusal of the state House of Assembly to swear in Agboola as abuse of power and disregard for rule of law, calling on the leader of the NGF, Governor Kayode Fayemi, to intervene.

“We call on INEC, security agencies, local and international NGOs to call out the governor of Kwara state and the House of Assembly to urgently retract their undemocratic stand and steps, by quickly admitting and allowing democracy and justice to thrive in this instance. A word, they say, is enough for the wise”, he said.

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Shittu faulted the claim of the chairman, House committee on Information, Culture and Tourism, Awolola Ayokunle, which said the House was served a court summon joining the Speaker and Clerk to the House, a motion on notice, filed in the Federal High Court by Hassan Abdulazeez, seeking to refrain the House from swearing-in Agboola pending determination of the case.

He said the reason given by the legislature for not swearing in the PDP lawmaker was amusing and laughable, adding that the court of appeal is the final arbiter for all litigations arising from national and state Assembly elections.

“To this end, the judgement of the Appeal Court declaring Agboola as the winner of the Ilorin South constituency election cannot be appealed nor can there be any stay of execution of the court judgement”, he said.

Shittu who said that the action of the leadership of the House should be condemned by all, irrespective of political affiliations, added that it is a violation of court ruling and subversion of democracy.