By Ikechukwu Nnochiri

Recent appointments of national chairmen of the PDP were masked in intrigues centered around the judiciary. The latest effort in finding a new national chairman is proving not to be an exception.

JUDICIAL intrigues have never been in short supply within the political fold of the ruling Peoples Democratic Party, PDP. Hardly had there been an election-whether internal or general, involving the party without the courts having a role!

The judiciary has especially come to the fore in determining the leadership of the party particularly in the past five years. Remarkably, the last three chairmen of the party, Dr. Bello Mohammed, Dr. Okwesileze Nwodo and Chief Vincent Ogbulafor have one way or the other come under legal scrutiny for actions taken prior to their emergence to the top position.

It was as such not surprising that just on the eve of the party’s national convention to elect a new set of party executives that it is now commonly whispered that among the qualifications desired by the party hierarchy for consideration are “skeletons in the cupboard”.

It is also not surprising that one of the leading candidates for the job is now whispered to have “issues” with his nomination form and an unpleasant history with some not too straight activities that were covered up for him by a former president.

With the possible exception of the first two chairmen of the party, that is Chief Solomon Lar and Chief Barnabas Gemade, subsequent party chairmen had been heralded in and out of office with a large dose of intrigues sometimes centered around the courts.

The most captivating cases were, however, centered around the duo of Prince Vincent Ogbulafor and Dr Okwesilieze Nwodo, who coincidentally, were the only two persons from the South-East geopolitical region to be substantive chairmen of the party,apart from Dr Alex Ekwueme, who was protem chairman in 1998.

Ogbulafor, Bello, Baraje and Nwodo

In Nwodo’s case, the multiple litigations ended when a High Court in Enugu sacked him barely 24 hours to the national convention of the party held on January 15, 2011.

On the eve of the presidential primaries of the party held at the Eagle Square, Abuja, an Enugu High Court presided over by Justice Reuben Onuorah, granted an interim injunction restraining Nwodo from parading himself as a member and as an officer of the party.

Justice Onuorah granted the order following a motion ex-parte in suit E/449/2010 filed by one Mr. Collins Amalu (a member of the PDP in Enugu) and supported by a written address and an affidavit of eight paragraphs he deposed to before the court, which requested that Nwodo be removed from the party on the grounds that he was not a card-carrying member of PDP.

While Nwodo was busy perfecting arrangement towards the smooth conduct of the PDP national convention, little did he know that his foes were equally busy perfecting an order to douse his powers.

Before the Enugu case Nwodo was also fighting another action instituted against him by a card-carrying member of the Party from Imo State, Ikenga Ugochinyere, who challenged the selection of Dr Nwodo as the National Chairman of the party.

Arguing through his counsel, Mr Innocent Onwu, the plaintiff contended that the appointment of  Nwodo as National Chairman of the party violated Section 85 of the Electoral Act of 2006 and the party’s constitution.

He further argued that the action of the party regarding the appointment contravened Sections 221, 222, 223, 224 as well as 225 of the 1999 Constitution.

However, counsel to Nwodo, Chief E.C Ukala had in a preliminary objection against the suit, challenged the jurisdiction of the high court to entertain the matter, maintaining that the appointment of his client was purely an internal affair of the party.

He further queried the locu-standi of the plaintiff to maintain the suit, which he described as a gross abuse of the judicial process. The case was still pending before the curtain was drawn by the Enugu High Court.

Nwodo, however, had prior to his emergence as national chairman been cleared of allegations of impropriety in the national identity card scam for which the Independent Corrupt Practices and other related offences Commission, ICPC had indicted him in 2003. That indictment was another case of intrigue that heralded his forced exit from the office of national secretary of the party.

Nwodo’s emergence as national chairman in 2010 followed the forced exit of Ogbulafor, who was found on the wrong side of the politics of the emergence of Dr. Jonathan as Acting President of the country.

Ogbulafor’s fall from office was purportedly a direct fallout of a judicial proceeding that was initiated against him by the ICPC, over his alleged complicity in a N2.3 billion contract scam. Ogbulafor was docked by the anti-graft agency on a 17 count criminal charge alongside two of his alleged accomplices, Mr. Emeka Ebilah and Mr Jude Nwokoro.

The accused persons were subsequently granted bail by trial judge, Justice Ishaq Bello on May 10, 2010, in the sum of N5million, with a caveat that they must produce two sureties each in like sum.

Though it has been over a year since the trial commenced, the matter has gradually died a natural death, a development that has given breath to insinuation that the entire hullabaloo that culminated to his sack as the chairman of the party, was a calculated political move masterminded by varying interests within the party.

Remarkably, Ikenga Ugochinyere who initiated a court action to disqualify Nwodo from holding the office of the national chairman is also in court seeking legal action to bar Alhaji Bamanga Tukur from holding the office of national chairman of the party on the allegation that he, Tukur was not a fit and proper person to hold the office of the national chairman of the party!