By Ochereome Nnanna
IT came like a bombshell to many Nigerians that Tuesday, November 8, 2010 when most electronic media announced the sack of Governor Emmanuel Uduaghan of Delta State by the Court of Appeal presided over by Justice Monica Dongban-Mensah in Benin City.

Following the withdrawal of the suit by Mr Peter Okocha, the former gubernatorial candidate of the Action Congress (AC) when he joined the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) earlier this year, not many people paid further attention to the case, which his opponent, Mr Great Ogboru of the Democratic Peoples Party (DPP) was till pursuing.

Unlike similar cases in the past (such as those of Edo, Ondo and Ekiti states) which awarded victories to the opponents, Uduaghan found himself in the class of other PDP governors (such as Timipre Sylva of Bayelsa, Liyel Imoke of Cross River, Ibrahim Idris of Kogi and others) who were sent back to the polls for a re-run within 90 days. In none of these instances did any PDP governor fail to win to return to the government house after a three-month sabbatical as a “civilian”.

Meanwhile, let us examine the usual call for governors and other occupants of elected offices sacked by tribunals to be made to pay a price for occupying the offices “illegally” due to their “stolen mandates”. This has been raised by some people, including lawyers, against Uduaghan since his ouster. I make bold to describe such calls as mere academic exercises.

There is nothing in our laws that stipulates that a person who was sacked by the courts over a “stolen mandate” is actually a felon or criminal. The reason is simple. He was duly declared as the winner by the statutory body charged with conducting elections – the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). If the case goes to the Election Petition Tribunal and he gets awarded victory he is still on the right side of the law until and if the final court of law decides otherwise.

And if eventually he is sent away by a superior court, all actions he took while in office would remain binding even though the law pretends that those actions are not recognised by it.

There is really little anyone can do about the fact that Dr Chris Ngige was once the governor of Anambra State, for instance, and there is no punishment that can be meted to him for being declared governor (albeit wrongly) by a lawfully constituted INEC. We just have to live with the oddity until the laws are reviewed to ensure that no one is allowed to occupy a position he did not deserve in the first place.

The sack of Uduaghan six months to the end of his four-year tenure comes as an anti-climax and with its string of questions. If it were a question of sending him away and bringing in a new helmsman, it would have qualified as “justice at last”.

However, Uduaghan is being asked to go back to the polls, with the DPP’s Ogboru as his main contender. If Uduaghan wins again will he be starting his first term afresh as if the past 40 months did not happen? In that case he will be having a total of 11 and half years to occupy the governor’s seat. This is where the real danger lies in delaying the election petition process this long.

As for Uduaghan’s political enemies, the task of preventing him from returning is an uphill one. Nobody can remove the PDP ticket from him. Plans by Chief Edwin Clark and his followers, who had hoped to tap into their Aso Villa connection to have Uduaghan arrested by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), have been foiled as the Commission says it has nothing on him.

If they had hoped for the PDP to declare it had no candidate in Delta for the re-run to allow Clark’s preferred choice to emerge from the opposition party and later declare for the PDP, they have also failed because the President, Goodluck Jonathan, has already pledged to campaign for Uduaghan.

Many of us found it nauseating that former Governor James Ibori succeeded in imposing his cousin as his successor. We were also dismayed by Uduaghan’s efforts to get his cousin freed from culpability for his crimes both at home and abroad. However, as a governor, Uduaghan showed a lot of vision.

Delta State was the first of the core Niger Delta states to achieve calm in the creeks and waterways while the Niger Delta crisis was in full spate. He was the first to establish a separate commission to administer the derivation royalties directly to the oil producing communities with the Delta State Oil Producing Areas Development Communities (DESOPADEC), which other oil states later copied.

Most importantly, through his bid to reduce dependency on oil proceeds, he sought to divide the state into two economic zones: the south (Warri, Sapele, Koko) as areas for oil and gas-related industries and the north (Asaba, Agbor) as commercial zones tied to the South Eastern commercial town of Onitsha.

For the first time, the dichotomy between the north and south of Delta State was whittled down because Uduaghan evenly spread development in the state.

The development of an international airport in Asaba-Okpanam-Ogwashi-Uku (a project awarded to a Delta North contractor) was an improvement on Ibori’s legacies. During Ibori’s eight years, Asaba, the state capital and environs were neglected while Warri and Oghara were treated like the real state capitals.

It is up to the Delta electorate to decide whether Uduaghan’s efforts were good enough to earn him victory in February 2011. Fortunately for him he has things to point to when the campaigns begin.