BY ANTHONY OCHELA
Supreme Court has restored Senator Samuel Anyanwu as the National Secretary of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP.
The five-member panel led by Justice Jamilu Tukur, in an unanimous decision, vacated the concurrent verdicts of the Federal High Court and Court of Appeal in Enugu, which dismised him from office.
In the lead judgement, Justice Tukur held that the two lower courts lacked jurisdiction to interfere in the domestic affairs of a political party that was not justiciable.
The Supreme Court panel, consequently, affirmed the minority judgement of the Appellate Court which nullified the decision of the trial court on account of lack of jurisdiction.
The court also held that the plaintiff, Mr Aniagu Emmanuel, whose suit led to Anyanwu’s removal from office, lacked the locus standi to do so.
It held that the plaintiff failed to establish how he was affected by who occupied the office of the national secretary of PDP.
The Appellate Court had, in a judgement it delivered last December, upheld the High Court’s verdict that sacked Senator Anyanwu and recognised Chief Udeh-Okoye Enemchukwu as the authentic national scribe of the party.
In its lead judgement delivered by Justice Ridwan Abdullahi, the Appellate Court dismissed as incompetent and lacking in merit, Anyanwu’s bid to upturn the decision of the high court.
The court held that his continued stay in office as national secretary was in breach of PDP’s constitution, having contested and emerged as its candidate in the governorship election held in Imo State last year.
Dissatisfied with the concurrent judgements of the two courts, Anyanwu approached the Supreme Court to set them aside.
Anyanwu also filed a motion for accelerated hearing and for the abridgment of time within which the matter would be determined, citing the crucial role of the office of the national secretary in the affairs of a political party.
It would be recalled that both the Board of Trustees, BoT, and the National Working Committee, NWC, of the PDP, had earlier endorsed Chief Okoye as the National Secretary of the party, in line with the subsisting court judgements.
