By Ikechukwu Nnochiri
ABUJA — Confusion emerged in Katsina State, weekend, following the judgment of the Supreme Court that invalidated the February 2011 decision of a Federal High Court sitting in Abuja which gave two Senators and eight House of Representatives members the legal platform to contest the April general election.

The Supreme Court had in a judgment it delivered on Friday, ousted the jurisdiction of the Federal High Court and the Appeal Court which initially adjudicated on the authenticity of two separate primary elections in Katsina State prior to the election.

Justice Abdul Kafarati had in February given Senator Yakubu Lado and 44 others the legal platform to contest the election as the authentic candidates of the Congress for Progressive Change, CPC, as against the list endorsed and submitted to the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, by the party, which had former Speaker of the House of Representatives, Alhaji Aminu Bello Masari and others as candidates.

It was on the strength of the high court judgment that Senator Lado and the eight House of Reps members contested and won the National Assembly election which was challenged at the Abuja Division of the Appeal Court.

The Appeal Court had, in its own judgment, validated the original list of the party which had Masari and others as candidates.

The judgment of the Appeal Court was cross appealed by Lado at the Supreme Court which, weekend, stripped itself and other lower courts of jurisdiction, thereby leaving uncertainty on the position of Lado and the others.

In his lead judgment, the Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Dahiru Musdapher, held that “section 87 of the Electoral Act 2010 as amended, deals with the procedure for the nomination of a candidate by a political party for any election and specifically provided a remedy for an aggrieved aspirants who participated at the party primaries which produced the winner by the highest number of votes.

“Where, however, there is a dispute as in the instant case to which two primaries of a political party produced the nominated candidate, that dispute is not justiceable and the court will have no jurisdiction to entertain same.

CPC welcomes S’Court’s decision

Meanwhile, the CPC in a statement, weekend, in Abuja, welcomed the Supreme Court judgment.

The statement signed by its National Publicity Secretary, Mr Rotimi Fashakin reads: “After the party’s candidates were communicated to the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, the subsequent litigation in the courts (by aggrieved party folks) was not truncated because of the belief in promoting democratic culture based on equity and justice. It is, therefore, gratifying to note that the Supreme Court has merely affirmed the party’s position.

“Indeed, the CPC family remains indissoluble and united. The Supreme Court’s judgment has further accentuated the widely held dictum of party supremacy. The party’s position of ‘no victor, no vanquished’ means that all contending forces in the disputes must unite since the finality has been struck by the nation’s apogee in legal adjudication.”