PDP chides Labour Party, Abia Assembly Speaker for protesting against Appeal Court Judgment sacking Nwokocha, says protest affront to Judiciary

The People’s Democratic Party in Abia State, has come hard on the Labour Party in the state and the Speaker Abia House of Assembly Rt. Hon Austin Meregini for protesting the sack of the Senate Minority Whip, Darlington Nwokocha,by the Court of Appeal.

The Party in a Press briefing in Umuahia, described the protest as irresponsible, an affront to the judiciary and as well,capable of truncating democracy.

The Labour Party led by its Chairman Ceekay Igara and Speaker of the House Rt. Hon. Meregini had on Monday embarked on a demonstration to protest the verdict of the Appellate Court Lagos Division which nullified the February 25 election of Nwokocha if the LP as the Senator representing Abia Central in favour of Col. Austin Akobundu of the PDP.

According to the PDP Vice Chairman/Acting State Publicity Secretary, Elder Abraham Amah, the Party criticized without reservation, the demonstration by members of the Labour Party stressing that the PDP had issued a press statement on Sunday after it received intelligence reports that the Labour Party had mobilized its members in Ikwuano Local Government Area, the home LGA of the Senator-elect, Col. Akobundu and across the State, to embark on a march to protest the judgement of a court of competent and final jurisdiction and alerted the security agencies to stop the protest and forestall the breakdown of law and order in the State.

“Despite our warnings, we are surprised that the Labour Party did not heed our advice and went ahead with the protest which is laughable, given that the Court of Appeal would never bow to any arm twisting and reverse itself because of some sort of threats by people who felt disfavored by the court ruling”.

The PDP frowned at the demonstration, stating that it however showed how people could condescend to make a point.

Amah posited that the PDP unearthed accurate intelligence which showed that the government might be aware of the exercise and dubbed the demonstration as the ‘Mother of all Protests’ in Nigeria, “This is the first time in the history of our democracy that a political party would take the liberty to abuse members of the esteemed Bench, simply because its case fell flat on its face due to irreconcilable differences with provisions of extant laws of Nigeria”.

He added that the demonstration is a call to anarchy and the good people of Abia State would not sit idly by and watch it trample on the rights of others.

“Without prejudice to the facts of the matter, the Labour Party displayed ignorance by whipping up sentiments and reducing the judgment of the Appeal Court to only Section 77 of the Electoral Act. Even at that, it refused to realize the fact that a Court of Appeal had also ruled that Section 77 which deals with nomination of candidates, is both a pre-election and post-election matters”.

The Party while calling on its members and Abians to remain vigilant, called on security agencies to “bring to justice all the actors involved in the actionable act capable of truncating our democracy, especially those who are not mindful of the fact that the protest against the judiciary is an affront to the concept of separation of powers.

Earlier, the State PDP Deputy Chairman,Hon Nwachukwu, disclosed that the PDP in the state is still intact and as a matter of fact, it is still in charge because the party connotes power.

In his words,”Abia PDP is 100 percent intact. The state executive members,as well as the Local Government and Ward leaders are still very much glued to the party.
“PDP is power, PDP in Abia has not cracked,we are still in charge”.

In a vote of thanks, the scribe of the Party,Barr David Iro, appreciated the media for their role in making sure the voices of all political parties in the state are heard, promising that the Party is law abiding and would continue to intimate its members to remain so.