Abia Crisis: INEC's New Stand Favours the Emergence of Uche Ogah...See Details

Posted by George on Fri 01st Jul, 2016 - tori.ng

The current position of INEC on the political crisis in Abia State has favoured the emergence of Ikpeazu's political rival as governor.

'Governor' Okezie Ikpeazu

The Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, on Friday has backed its stand on issuing a certificate of return to Governor Okezie Ikpeazu's political rival, Uche Sampson Ogah as the next governor of the state.

The electoral commission defended its stand on the ground that it received a notice of appeal from the Abia State governor, Okezie Ikpeazu but the presented documents did not contain a stay-of-execution order, to stop the issuance of a certificate of return.

A Federal High Court in Abuja on Monday presided over by Justice Okon Abang had ordered the immediate sack of the governor for an alleged forgery of tax documents. He issued an order for the installation of the main challenger of Ikpeazu at the 2014 People's Democratic Party gubernatorial primary election.

In an explanation to Premium Times on Friday, Nick Dazang, spokesman for INEC, said Mr. Ikpeazu’s failure to provide a stay-of-execution order left the commission with no choice than to issue the certificate of return to Mr. Ogah.

He said since Mr. Ikpeazu’s notice was not deemed sufficient, it had to, as a matter of policy, execute the judgment of the high court.

“I discovered that INEC received Mr. Ikpeazu’s notice. However, it did not contain a motion or order of stay of execution. In the circumstance, and in deference to the previous court order, INEC as a responsible regulatory (body) has no recourse than to issue Mr. Ogah the certificate of return,” Mr. Dazang said.

“By law, a certificate of return is supposed to be issued within one week. Also, the commission has decided as a matter of policy to obey all subsisting court orders. That means if the court were to issue a contradictory order, INEC has no option than to obey.”

But Abia State Attorney-General, Umeh Kalu, in an earlier statement on Thursday night, said the governor’s legal team included the notice of stay of execution order with the appeal notice delivered to INEC.