•Barrister MONIMA EDWARD KARIBI-WHYTE Tells City People
Barrister Monima Edward Karibi-Whyte is a Port Harcourt based Lawyer, from the Karibi-Whyte family of Abonnema in Akuku-Toru Local Government Area of Rivers state. His uncle and late elder statesman, a retired Justice of the Supreme Court of Nigeria and Judge of the World Court at Hague, Justice Adolphus Karibi Whyte must have left an indelible footprint in legal practice to which he is steadily following. With many years of Legal Practice, Barrister Monima Edward Karibi Whyte is a Notary Public and a well celebrated Legal Practitioner who is currently handling very tough political cases in Rivers State.
City People’s Port Harcourt Bureau Chief, EMEKA AMAEFULA +234(0)8111813069 was at his Coronation Chambers at no. 31 Oromenike Lane D/Line District of Port Harcourt Rivers State where he revealed details of the suit filed by the Allied Peoples Movement (APM), as Plaintiff, against INEC, PDP, Siminialaye Fubara and Professor (Mrs.) Ngozi Ordu, as Respondents to the Originating Summons in which APM through its Counsel, Barrister Karibi-Whyte is praying the court for “a declaration that the 1st Defendant is not entitled to accord recognition to any nomination or sponsorship of either the 3rd or 4th Defendants of the 2nd Defendants for the post of Governor and Deputy Governor of Rivers State subject matter of the declarations, scheduled to be conducted by the 1st Defendant in Rivers State during the 2023 General Election in Nigeria et al.”
Below are details of the case.
Can you please tell us about the matter that you took to court against the Peoples Democratic and INEC?
There are several cases. There is a case the Peoples Democratic Party PDP filed against my client, Allied Peoples Movement (APM) at the Federal High Court, Port Harcourt judicial division, seeking to nullify the Primaries that produced the House of Assembly candidates. And that one has been adjourned for judgment. While on the other hand the Allied Peoples Movement also instituted, through my office, an action against the PDP, INEC and the gubernatorial and Deputy Governorship candidates of the PDP in Rivers State.
What are the details of the one you instituted against the PDP now before Federal High Court in Port Harcourt?
The issues are first of all the issue of campaign, prior to the lifting of the ban on electioneering campaigns by INEC which is the first defendant, the PDP and the gubernatorial candidate both governorship and deputy governorship embarked on a series of outlandish political campaigns such as coming up with billboards, posters, and all kinds of electronic campaign materials which were displayed all over Port Harcourt within the jurisdiction of the court. And when we noticed it the Allied Peoples Movement realizing that the electoral atmosphere should be one of a level playing field where everybody would be allowed to commence campaigns at the same time, especially in a situation where INEC has an electoral time table which allow people contesting for governorship in all the states in the federation to commence their campaigns on the 12th day of October, 2022. But that notwithstanding, the gubernatorial candidates of the PDP commenced theirs before then. And that issue came to the notice of our client and immediately they got wind of it they assembled evidence by taking photographs of the campaign materials prior to the time when INEC lifted the ban. And we now went to court to complain about that action. Secondly, there was the issue of the employment status of the 3rd defendant, that is the gubernatorial candidate of the PDP. He is a public servant, serving as the Accountant General of Rivers State. And in accordance with the provisions of the Constitution of Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 as Amended and the Electoral Act 2022, he has no business participating in political matters except to go and vote as somebody that is registered as a voter in Nigeria.
What are the prayers of your Client?
We want INEC to do its job in accordance with the provisions of section 285(14) (c) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended). Section 285(14) allows political parties “for the purpose of this section pre-election matters means any matter an aspirant who claims that any of the provisions of the electoral act has not been complied with. 285(14)(C)says political parties challenging the action or decision or activities of INEC disqualifying its candidate from participating in an election or a complain that the provisions of the Electoral Act” like we are doing…we are saying that the electoral Act provides that participation will be restricted to civil servants as they are not allowed to participate. And that 285(14)(c) says “A political party challenging the action or decisions or activities of INEC disqualifying its candidate from participating in an election or a complaint that provisions of the Electoral Act or any other applicable Law has not been complied with by INEC in respect to nomination of candidates of political parties in an election Time Table for an election registration of voters and other activities of the commission with respect of preparation for INEC in an election. What we are saying here is, INEC has a laid down procedure provided for where INEC deviates from carrying out its duties by allowing persons that are not qualified to contest by publishing their names or clearing them. It is the duty of other political parties to go to court and by way of an Order of Mandamus compel INEC to do its work and remove their names by way of disqualifying them.
So, your client is asking the Federal High court to disqualify the governorship candidate of PDP?
Yes.
What are the other issues that are before the Federal High Court that you are asking the court to look at?
Those are the 2 main issues. Though, the only other underlying relief there we may be asking the court for is that the court should disqualify the PDP because INEC has a time table for provision of names of candidates. When you do not do that properly when your time runs out and you are now disqualified, you as a political party cannot now reproduce another one. Because they brought a defective candidate, once the court throws out his name, the next step the court should take will be to disqualify the PDP.
Once the PDP candidate is disqualified INEC will now disqualify the PDP from producing any other governorship candidate in this election.
Can’t the party go back and do the nomination of the governorship candidate?
You can only go back and do a substitution in the event of the death of the governorship candidate or a withdrawal by the governorship candidate. Since those two underlying factors are missing here. And what you have is a disqualification.
We have some events in other states of the federation where the court is asking parties to go back and conduct party delegate election primaries within 14 days that can produce another candidate?
Yes, that is a situation where the issue of picking of delegates was brought into issue and the court now over ruled the position of the party. And there were no prayers asking for disqualification. Here, we have a full back package. And we are asking the court to do what it is supposed to do. Once they are disqualified, you cannot be withdrawn from what you are not. So, the disqualification will warrant an automatic disqualification of the party. The PDP governorship candidate will not be on the ballot come 2023 in Rivers State gubernatorial race. That is the objective of this suit.
You Mean Allied Peoples Movement against the PDP?
Allied Peoples Movement-APM against Independent National Electoral Commission-INEC, PDP, the gubernatorial candidate and his deputy. This is because the deputy is flying on the wings of the candidate and if the candidate fails the deputy collapses. Yes, it is a joint ticket. If he is withdrawing, you can now say because in accordance to the constitution the party can now bring in the deputy to replace him. In this case there is no need for substitution. The issue of substitution is thrown out.
Let us look at the argument on points of the law?
Yes, if we are looking at it from the issue of substitution the law says “Nemo dat quod non habet” meaning “you cannot give what you don’t have.” Now as a candidate if you are a valid and properly nominated candidate, what you are doing is running the campaigns for your party. If now you are disqualified you become an improper candidate-a misfit. In the case that you are a misfit, you will not have the authority, the temerity or the locus to transfer anything to anybody. This is because you don’t have it. It is what you have that you can give.
That is what we are telling the court. So, it is not disqualifying the gubernatorial candidate it also includes disqualifying PDP from sponsoring another candidate for bringing up a defective candidate. And your Timeline has expired. It is all over for them.
Apart from Delegates election, can’t they get it through Consensus which is an option?
Election has been defined in the electoral Act to be either Direct, Indirect or by Consensus. So, it is all election whichever way you want to do it, it is all election. When we have exceeded the issue of election and you have gone to the level of providing a candidate which is the issue we are, once the court determines that candidate as being defective, unable to hold the mandate of the party, as we are saying that he lacks, the court will now have to disqualify the party and prevent the party from being an obstacle in the electoral process.
Has any court taken such a decision before in any states of the federation?
Yes, they did it last time with APC in Rivers State. The court disqualified the APC candidates by virtue of nomination of candidate.
And we are in court with that one. So, it is not the first time. It won’t be the first time. With the new electoral Act there are a lot of new developments. A lot of fresh areas have been touched now. Even the politicians, even legislators that drafted it probably did not expect it to be so far enriched. I think it is a watershed in the history of our electoral process. They never did this well before because something tells me that they didn’t even know what they were doing as they probably got some people who did it for them.
Like they shot themselves on their foot like duringthe party delegate election some of them were not allowed by the new electoral Act, wasn’t it so?
Oh yes, it was so. And now there is the issue of double nomination. You can’t be nominated twice. You cannot go and run for Presidency and you come back and say you want to become a governorship candidate or Senatorial candidate, it does not work that way again unlike before. Everything has changed.
Let us look at the Time line in the pre-election matters before the courts. What are the positions of the Court Rules for the period for the determination of such cases. Must the cases continue in court after one of the parties must have been sworn into office?
A lot of things have changed. What the law now says is that the High Court matters in section 285 of the constitution. Section 285 has 14 subsections. Section 285(6) says “The Initial matter that will be filed in the Federal high court will take only 180 days” no more, no less. If the parties want to waste time and be taking adjournments or the court is giving adjournments the matter will abate.
How?
It will abate and the court will not be able to continue with it after 180-days no extension of time that is permitted. That is why parties are enjoined to finish their matters. Most of the ones we are doing will terminate even before 100-days. While, section 285(7) says that the court of Appeal will take only 60-days. The Supreme Court takes only 60-days. They are all pre-election matters. Matters that are commenced before the conduct of elections. And they were also defined in that section 285. So, this time around things have changed. The new electoral Act 2022 has now breathed life into section 285 of the Constitution which appeared to be dormant earlier but it is now beginning to be revived. And that has taken charge of electoral processes in Nigeria.
We have seen a situation where in Nigeria, given the transition from military rule to democratic governance, where the businessmen-politicians, that is the elites, have taken political power away from the citizens, they don’t want the people to participate in the selection of party candidates through delegates elections. These businessmen-politicians go inside one hotel room and produce a list of delegates or list of probable candidates as that of choice of the supposed party delegates like what has transpired in APC in Rivers State with two factions and similar things are happening all over Nigeria from 1999 to 2022. So, how do we use the new Electoral Act 2022 to take political power back to the citizens?
The truth about it is that no matter how well drafted the Electoral Act and the Constitution are if not closely followed by the populace, if not closely monitored, if not properly administered by way of direct participation, it will amount to nothing. If you don’t go and register and have your Permanent Voters’ Card-PVC, others will vote for it. And when they vote for you, you should not be seen to be complaining. The heat of that itself is even provided in section 285 which says that you cannot declare a person that is section 285(13) That the court should not declare a person that did not participate in an election as winner. That did not fully participate in an election as the winner. Like that of Amaechi Vs PDP and Celestine Omehia. So, the issue of Amaechi in the 2007 Supreme Court Judgment is taken care of by the amendment of that section 285 of 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. Where you make an attempt to run for primaries and you did not succeed, you didn’t contest for Primaries then, you didn’t contest the main election and all of a sudden court awards you judgment the likes of Amaechi should consider themselves lucky under the present dispensation because it cannot happen again. Or those who will go and run for Presidency or Governorship and when that one doesn’t work you now go like Owelle Rochas Okorocha of Imo state, when one attempt fails you now go back to other options at the same electoral year. Senate President Lawan tried it and Senator Godswill Obot Akpabio tried it and lost it at Appeal Court. Even that one which I am waiting for is that of the Bauchi state governor His excellency Bala Mohammed.
What are the issues about his second term Governorship bid after he participated in the PDP Presidential Primary election in 2022?
It will come up. They must challenge it. Bauchi will not be all that too different. He purchased the Presidential aspiration Expression of Intent Form and submitted it and he did not withdraw. Somebody should test it and contest it in court. As the legal jurisprudence of the country expands the courts are empowered to redesign and redefine the electoral sphere with the aim of assisting INEC to conduct more peaceful elections.
-Emeka Amaefula
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