The dramatic dethronement of the powerful Emir of Kano, Muhammad Sanusi II, on March 9, 2020 by the governor of Kano State is a compelling story all its own, but it highlights the question of why the long-lingering kingship crisis in Awka, with its deeply debilitating effect on Awka political economy, has not been decisively tackled by the governor of Anambra State. Is the Awka crisis more intractable? Are the contending forces more formidable? Or is there a Machiavellian attempt to keep Awka politically embroiled, weakening its ability to compete for authoritative allocations? Awka Times weighs up the evidence.

By Chudi Okoye

It wasn’t quite the ‘ides’ (i.e. middle) of March, as in the Shakespearean tragedy, Julius Caesar. But a local soothsayer might well have warned Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, the erstwhile Emir of Kano, to beware the ‘tides’ of March!

It was high noon on this fateful day in Kano as news broke of high palace drama in the ancient emirate: Following a long-drawn series of political and ideological confrontations with factions of the secular and clerical wings of the Northern establishment, the 14^th Emir of Kano Emirate, Muhammad Sanusi II, was dethroned on March 9, 2020 by Gov. Abdullahi Umar Ganduje of Kano State.

It was an ignominious end to the regnal career of the public intellectual who urged changes upon the reactionary institutions of the Islamic North, just as he had nudged the chaotic institutions of the Nigerian banking sector towards radical reform when he served as Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN). With his reformist agenda, he clearly confronted the powerful forces that controlled the institutions of finance and monarchy. He had to go.

As Central Bank governor, though acclaimed the world over for his reforms, Sanusi made powerful enemies and could not even make it to a fifth-year tenure before being chucked out. He had been appointed CBN governor on June 3, 2009, only to be dismissed on February 20, 2014.

As a reform-minded emir admired by liberal constituencies in Nigeria and beyond, he made even more powerful enemies and could not make it to a sixth-year tenure before being edged out from what could have been a lifetime perch for the 58-year old. He had been appointed Emir of Kano on June 8, 2014, coronated on February 7, 2015, only to be dethroned on March 9, 2020. The reason offered for his dethronement was an exercise in studied deprecation: “insubordination” and “disrespect to lawful instructions from the office of the state governor and other lawful authorities.”

In each of these dramatic dismissals, Sanusi was removed as the ‘Ides of March’ loomed. Sanusi’s well-groomed career, in money management and monarchy, ended almost as a Shakespearean tragedy.

To compound his misery, within hours of being dethroned as emir, Sanusi was banished from Kano to Loko, a nondescript mini-port town on the banks of the Benue River in Nasarawa State. Within ours of arriving Loko, the deposed emir was bundled off to yet another exile location in Awe LGA, in the same state. Emir Sanusi was uprooted from the grand opulence of the Kano palace, first to an unlit and unkempt bungalow in Loko, and then reportedly on to an apartment in Awe.

There had been epic drama surrounding his eviction from Gidan Rumfa, the grand 33-acre palace compound of the Emir of Kano which dates back to the 15^th century. The eviction was marked by rushed indignities as a phalanx of security and other vehicles whisked him away at bolting speed through the vaulting gates of the palace. Sanusi’s destination into potential oblivion had just begun, though there is scant certitude that this highly opinionated intellectual will suffer his political banishment in sullen quietude.

After Kano, Rethinking Awka Kingship Crisis

The brutal efficiency with which the powerful Emir of Kano – a well-regarded professional and highly connected Fulani aristocrat – could be removed by a state governor is proof of the power of elected politicians in the current democratic dispensation in Nigeria. The fact that Sanusi was removed so unceremoniously, without much apparent concern for popular reprisals, offers a poignant statement of the balance of power between elected officials and traditional rulers.

But if the Kano State government could deploy such brutal efficiency in dealing with monarchic intrigue, why cannot, or why has not, the government of Anambra State moved with decisive vigor to stamp out the kingship crisis long festering in the capital city, Awka? We have reported prodigiously in Awka Times  the unresolved conflict which has seized the capital monarchy in Anambra State.

The basic facts of the Awka kingship conundrum are as follows:

1. The purported dethronement in 2017 of the Awka traditional ruler, Eze Uzu II, His Majesty Obi Dr Gibson Nwosu, who appears to have lost significant support among Awka people but is nonetheless officially recognized by the state government. The Governor of Anambra State is considered, in the political zeitgeist and governing laws for the kingship institution, as the ratifying authority in the selection of an Eze Uzu. So official recognition imbues Eze Uzu Gibson Nwosu with significant advantage, despite his loss of support among Awka chieftaincy institutions and apparent dissipation of popular support.

2. The purported enstoolment of a new traditional ruler in Awka in the person of Augustine Ndigwe, “His Imperial Majesty, Eze Uzu III, Obi of Awka”, per his regnal claim. Ndigwe, like Nwosu, lacks overwhelming support among Awka people, as shown in Awka Times survey. Neither appears to enjoy commanding acclamation as the incumbent Eze Uzu, with Nwosu polling at a narrow plurality of 44% versus Ndigwe’s 39%. Ndigwe does suffer a statutory handicap, not being or likely to be recognized by the current administration in Anambra State, but he has the strategic backing of key chieftaincy institutions including Ozo Awka and the Council of Kingmakers, and also Otochal Awka, the revered oldest man in Awka gerontocratic tradition.

This then is part of the political situation in Awka today, a stalemated contest of “crowns” as it were, each side believing itself to possess the more credible claim to the Awka Stool and decidedly unwilling to concede.

Into this mix is thrown the crisis of Awka Development Union Nigeria, which has been longer in gestation, with contested factional claims to the position of ADUN president general and the right to conduct new ADUN elections.

There are several other aspects to the political tension in Awka, but the interlinked cases of kingship and town union crises are the ones in which the government of Anambra State could play a decisive role. But strangely the government’s role has been at best muted and indecisive, and even, some allege, partisan and Machiavellian.

Intricacies of Awka Kingship Crisis

Amidst the myriad political conflicts roiling Awka, we have not seen the Anambra State government play an assertive role, either to mediate the conflicts or, as we saw in Kano, to impose its will. The government seemingly prefers to take a side in the factional fight. In the kingship conflict, the state government has stood solidly behind Eze Uzu II Gibson Nwosu, refusing to acknowledge his purported impeachment and dethronement. Nwosu remains the officially certified incumbent, just as the government adamantly refuses to countenance Ndigwe’s claim to the Awka kingship stool. That of course is its prerogative.

Awka Times learned from sources in Ndigwe’s insurgent camp that after Nwosu was impeached in 2017 due to alleged breach of the kingship code of conduct, documents pertaining to the breach were sent to the state government’s ministry of chieftaincy and local government affairs inviting the government to verify the charges and impeachment process. The source indicates that government did not respond.

Similarly, after Ndigwe was installed by the breakaway elements of the Council of Kingmakers, the government was again sent notification with a request for recognition and certification. Again, sources say, the government was unresponsive. Perhaps government considered these maneuvers to be illegal and thus wished not to indulge them.

There is some divergence in how each of the kingship factions construes the role of government in the emergence of a traditional ruler. The Nwosu faction seems to consider the state authority something of a hegemon that confers recognition and certification, and thus political legitimacy. The Ndigwe faction, by contrast, insists that it is the community that selects its monarch and that legitimacy issues from the people. It argues that it is incumbent on government to certify a monarch chosen by the community.

The truth is probably in between these two claims.

The Awka Traditional Ruler’s Amended Constitution 1986 at Sections 8 to 14, and the Anambra State Traditional Ruler Law 2007 at Part II Sections 3 to 9, provide for the selection, presentation, recognition and certification of a traditional ruler. As we previously argued in Awka Times in our analysis of these laws:

There is… an unequivocal and irrefutable case to be made that the authority of an Eze Uzu is established upon formal recognition and certification by the Anambra State Governor. Going by the provisions of the Awka Traditional Ruler’s Constitution [and the Anambra State Traditional Ruler Law], the Governor would appear to be the ultimate grantor of rulership authority. But the matter cannot be as simple as that. For, while the Governor has ultimate certifying authority, the [Awka] constitution and its founding [state] laws make it clear that the Governor will be required to endorse the community’s choice, in so far as the proper selection procedure is followed and the candidate meets the criteria specified in state law. To an extent, the Governor’s constitutive power might be [considered] fiduciary, in that he is constrained to endorse the candidate chosen through the institutional processes of selection involving the whole community. The Governor cannot wantonly subvert the will of the people if the community speaks with one voice. However, the power of the Governor becomes more autonomous when there is ambiguity in the community, when there is contestation for the Stool and a crisis of legitimacy ensues.

The governor’s powers are also compelling with regard to decertification of a traditional ruler, though he exercises that power on the sufferance of a two-thirds majority in the State House of Assembly.

There is a significant difference between the decertification powers of the Anambra State governor and what transpired in Kano State on March 9^th. In Kano, according to the press statement announcing the dethronement of Sanusi II, Governor Ganduje acted in accordance with the Kano State Emirate Law 2019, and effectuated the dethronement and removal in concert with the Kano State Executive Council “after due consultation with the relevant stakeholders”. The charges levied against Sanusi, as indicated above, were “disrespect” and “insubordination” shown towards the state governor and other “lawful authorities”. This sort of deprecatory attitude towards the Kano monarch recalls the statement made in 1982 by a former governor of Kano State, Abubakar Rimi, with regard to the then Emir of Kano, Ado Bayero. Speaking to an NTA interviewer who was questioning his treatment of the supposedly powerful emir, Rimi retorted, his eyes flashing and his manner dismissive:

You are really trying to make the Emir of Kano something which he is not. Let me tell you something my friend. I will advice you to stop talking about this Emir of Kano. The way you press people, and the way our political opponents want to regard the Emir, that is not the way we regard the Emir. As far as we the elected government of Kano State are concerned, as far as I the Governor of Kano State am concerned, the Emir of Kano is nothing, nothing, nothing but a public officer… who is being paid from public funds, and whose appointment is at the pleasure of the Governor of the State, and who can be dismissed, removed, interdicted, suspended if he commits an offence. There is nothing absolutely unique about Ado Bayero, Emir of Kano. He is equal to any one of my eight emirs, and believe me, if he commits any offence which will make it necessary for us to remove him, we will remove him, and we will sleep soundly.

This was a remarkable statement from the radical governor which found resonance 38 years later in the inglorious discrowning of Lamido Sanusi.

We are accustomed to thinking of northern emirs as powerful potentates. But it appears that the governing laws under which they are selected and dismissed, at least in the case of Kano, offers more expansive powers to the governor than in Anambra State. In Anambra, according to the traditional ruler laws of Awka and the state, the monarch is selected or appointed by the community and only presented to the state for recognition and certification. The Staff of Office and the Cap are presented to the selected Eze Uzu by the community through the Council of Kingmakers, whereas the governor, following presentation and recognition, merely issues a certificate. By contrast, in Kano State, as in Rivers State and elsewhere, it is the governor that presents the staff of office to the traditional ruler.

We see a similarly counterintuitive reality with regard to the removal of a traditional ruler in Anambra. In Kano, it took merely a concert of the “Executive Council” and “consultation with the relevant stakeholders” for the emir to be dethroned. In Anambra, a traditional ruler can be decertified and derecognized by the governor, for breach of the code of conduct or to maintain public peace, but only with the approval of two-thirds of members of the State House of Assembly. Even at that, the decertified monarch merely loses recognition by the state. He ceases to draw official remuneration, cannot attend government fora in an official capacity, etc. But his Staff of Office and Cap remain the insignias of authority the withdrawal of which remains the community’s prerogative.

The Awka Traditional Ruler Constitution, at Articles 15 (a) to (d), provides for the removal of the Eze Uzu on ANY one of the following grounds:

• “Mental Capacity”
• “Proven case of public misconduct or conduct which is contrary to the Awka Chieftaincy Code of Conduct”
• “Withdrawal of recognition by the Government of the day”
• “If the incumbent is adjudged by Awka Community through Ndichie of having committed “Alu” (Abomination)”

The constitution then details, at Article 16, the processes that will be followed by the Council of Kingmakers to try the Eze Uzu, and impeach him, if found guilty of the alleged charges.

The Law and the Role of Government

The constitutional arrangement sketched above shows that in Awka, as distinct from Kano, there may be concurrent jurisdiction between community and state government in the legitimation of the traditional ruler. This constitutional framework erects the possibility that an Awka traditional ruler may be decertified by the state governor but could still retain community legitimacy. Conversely, it seems, an Eze Uzu may retain official government certification but lose community legitimacy if duly impeached for any of the reasons cited at Article 15!

It is a legal architecture which grants the community a measure of independence and seemingly affords it some protection from the vagaries of partisan politics.

But, alas, it is also a constitutional design that could engender factionalism and stalemate if the state government and the commanding institutions of the community are at odds. Depending on the relative strengths of the factions, the government of the day may be more or less able to impose its will on the community. When the factions are stalemated, as seems the case in Awka today, the government may have less room to maneuver than if one faction had overarching superiority.

Sadly, given the politics of resource competition in the state, it also means that frictional communities could be vulnerable to Machiavellian officials wishing to kindle tensions in competing communities, the better able to extract authoritative allocations for their own native communities. Such, too, is likely the case in terms of how Anambra state government officials are managing the crisis in Awka.

In conclusion, given what we have seen above, it may not be possible for the Anambra State government to intervene in the Awka kingship crisis quite as forcefully as did its counterpart in Kano. The constitutional arrangement in Anambra does not lend that latitude of state power, it seems.

But whatever the constitutional constraints against more forceful intervention, nothing stops Anambra State government, if it means well for its long-suffering capital, from mediating Awka political conflicts, such that instead of taking sides as some allege, it acts more as an honest and perceivably disinterested peace broker. That is the more certain way – in the absence of a deus ex machina as in Kano – to finally break the fever of kingship crisis in Awka.

… Supreme Court majority dismisses application to reverse initial ruling, ostensibly for lacking merit

 … Lone dissenting judge argued otherwise, urging colleagues to reinstate removed governor

… Unlike in Bayelsa State case, Supreme Court does not award costs

… Ruling perpetuates the tradition of kinetic party politics in Imo State

By Chudi Okoye

The petition from Imo loomed very large and hope had bloomed; but the case was probably doomed the moment Bayelsa was mooned by the Supreme Court.

Nigeria’s highest court had, on 14 January 2020 – following a petition brought by the opposition party – nullified the election of Hon. Emeka Ihedioha of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in the Imo State governorship election of 19 March 2019. Ihedioha and the PDP had filed an application on 6 February 2020 pleading with the Supreme Court to reverse that ruling. On Tuesday, 3 March 2020, after some delay in the controversial case, the Supreme Court ruled on the application: it refused to grant the plea and threw out the audacious application for want of merit.

The court’s dismissive ruling came as a shocking conclusion to the high-profile case, but it was not entirely surprising given the precedent of what transpired very recently in Bayelsa State where the court had refused even to entertain a judicial review of its initial ruling.

The Supreme Court was clearly in no mood for legal experimentation.

The Nigerian apex court had seemed apoplectic when the All Progressives Congress (APC) filed a petition asking it to review its ruling in the contested outcome of Bayelsa State 2019 gubernatorial election. The court had earlier delivered a ruling overturning the presumed victory of APC’s candidate in that state’s election, Mr. David Long, on the basis that his running mate, Mr. Biobarakuma Degi-Eremienyo, had filed forged certificates of qualification with the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). The apex court seemed upset to be asked by the losing side to review its judgement. In a splenetic February 26, 2020 decision, the court threw out the petition saying that it was “vexatious, frivolous, and constituted a gross abuse of court process.”

Justice Amina Augie, who read the decision of the Supreme Court, said that granting the application for judicial review would “amount to violating the finality of [the Supreme Court’s] judgment”, that such concession would open the “floodgate” for judicial review application, and that “there must be an end to litigation.”

Justice Augie said she had tears in her eyes and was filled with regret that “very senior” lawyers could file such an application. To demonstrate its disgust, the court awarded a cost of ₦10 million against each of the two lead appellant lawyers, Chief Afe Babalola (SAN) and Chief Wole Olanipekun (SAN), to be paid to each of the three respondents in the case – the PDP, its Bayelsa State governorship candidate, Duoye Diri, and his deputy, Lawrence Ewhruojakpo.

It all stacked up to a ₦60 million smacking.

Against this background, it had seemed improbable that the Supreme Court would grant a petition, as canvassed in the case of Imo State, asking it not simply for a judicial review but to reverse its own ruling.

Dramatic Overturn

It will be recalled that on 14 January 2020, the Supreme Court had delivered a bombshell ruling voiding the election of PDP’s Emeka Ihedioha as Imo State governor, declaring APC’s Hope Uzodinma as the winner of the 9 March 2019 Imo State governorship election. Uzodinma had in fact been 4^th-placed in the original vote tally. But Uzodinma had filed a complaint with the Imo State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal, claiming top position with a controversial re-computation that included votes from 388 polling stations which he argued that INEC had unlawfully excluded. He had lost the petition. He had also lost a petition on the same case filed at the Court of Appeal. Both the tribunal and the appeal court ruled that Uzodinma had not proved his allegation against the election of Ihedioha.

▲ Emeka Ihedioha vs Hope Uzodinma

But good fortune awaited the persistent Uzodinma, for on January 14 the Supreme Court, in a unanimous ruling delivered by Justice Kudirat Kekere-Ekun, found in his favor, agreeing with him that results from the 388 polling stations should be computed. The court ordered that Uzodinma be sworn-in as the rightful governor of Imo State.

In the highly-charged aftermath of the ruling, the dislodged Imo State Governor, Emeka Ihedioha, along with his party, PDP, had filed an application on February 6 asking the Supreme Court  to “set aside” its earlier ruling of January 14, arguing that the judgment was a nullity because it was procured by fraud.

The Imo case had seized public imagination far more than most such petitions, drawing widespread media coverage and sparking anti-Supreme Court demonstrations within and outside Nigeria. At a point, Washington DC-based National Press Club, the world’s largest professional organization for journalists, weighed in, berating the Nigerian Supreme Court for allegedly delivering a “flagrantly fraudulent” judgement. The association said global punitive action, including visa restrictions and international legal sanctions, could be sought against the justices if the decision was not reversed.

All this heightened expectations that Imo might prove different from Bayelsa.

No Hope for Ihedioha

The hearing of the ruling reversal application was not without some drama. Initially set to be heard on 18 February 2020, Ihedioha’s lawyer, Chief Kanu Agabi (SAN), had asked the court for adjournment to afford him time to study, and be in a position to respond to, the processes filed by the APC and Hope Uzodinma, the first and second respondents in the case. The seven-man panel of Supreme Court justices, led by Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Tanko Muhammad, had granted that request and fixed 2 March 2020 for the hearing.

However, when the matter was called up on March 2, Agabi yet again asked for a short adjournment, informing the court that he had just been served inside the court with the reply of the respondents and that he needed time to look at the documents in order to respond accordingly. The lawyer for Uzodinma and the APC, Mr. Damian Dodo (SAN) as well as INEC’s lawyer, Mr. Tanimu Inuwa (SAN), had said that they were ready to proceed with the hearing, but the CJN Justice Muhammad adjourned the hearing to the next day.

The court finally considered the application as adjourned on March 3. In a tough 6-1 decision, the Supreme Court panel dismissed the application requesting it to set aside its January 14 decision, arguing that the application lacked merit. Because the application prayed the apex court not for a judicial review but to reverse its initial ruling which nullified the election of Ihedioha, the panel majority, in a ruling read by Justice Olukayode Ariwoola, held that the application in fact amounted to asking the Supreme Court to sit on appeal over its own judgment. The majority held that the court lacked powers to do so in a judgment delivered on merit and in accordance with the dictates of the law and justice.

As Justice Ariwoola put it, “it is settled law that this court has no power to change or alter its own judgement or sit as an appellate court over its own judgement.” Continuing, he argued: “Certainly this court has no inherent power to grant what is being sought, it is beyond the powers of this court. There are no constitutional provisions for this court to review its own judgment.”

He said that on the basis of Order 8 Rule 16 of the Supreme Court, ”the general law is that [the court] has no power to alter any judgment.” He also referred to Section 235 of the 1999 Nigerian Constitution which he said provides that any judgment of the Supreme Court based on merit is final and shall not be reviewed under any guise once delivered, “except for clerical errors” or “if there is a missing link in the main body of the judgment.”

Justice Ariwoola concluded: “To say the least, this court has no competence and indeed lacked the power to sit on appeal in its own decision where the finality of the Supreme Court is entrenched in the constitution and inherent power can only be invoked where there is the law to do so.

“This court cannot ridicule, alter any judgment under any inherent power, as doing so would bring the court into disrepute and ridicule.

“The application is liable to dismissal and is hereby dismissed for want of jurisdiction and competence.”

Unlike the Bayelsa case, however, the justices did not award costs in the Imo case, stipulating that each side should bear its own cost.

The six majority justices on the Imo State panel were: CJN Tanko Muhammad, Olukayode Ariwoola who read the majority judgement, Sylvester Ngwuta, Kudirat Kekere-Ekun, Amina Augie and Uwani Abba-Aji.

Lonely Dissent

A dissenting opinion was offered by the 7^th member of the apex court panel, Justice Centus Nweze. Justice Nweze said that he agreed with the applicants that the Supreme Court’s initial judgement which declared Hope Uzodinma as winner was entered in error. As such, he said, the Supreme Court owed a duty to the principle of justice to set aside a decision it had rendered in error. He insisted that the Supreme Court had the power to overrule itself, and averred that the court had “done so in the past.”

▲ Lonely dissenter: Justice Centus Nweze

In a very sharp assessment, Justice Nweze said that “Mr. Uzodinma mischievously misled the court into [an] unjust conclusion with the unverified votes credited to himself in the disputed 388 polling units.”

He said that in his “intimate reading of the January 14 judgment, the meat and substance of Ihedioha’s matter were lost to time frame. This court once set aside its own earlier judgement and therefore cannot use the time frame to extinguish the right of any person.” This was a reference to the argument advanced by the respondents that the 60 days allowed for the Supreme Court to hear and rule on an appeal from the Court of Appeal in an election matter had elapsed by the time Ihedioha filed his application.

“This court’” Justice Nweze said, “has powers to overrule itself and can revisit any decision not in accordance with justice.”

He charged that Uzodinma and his party, the APC, misled the court into accepting the allegedly excluded results in 388 polling units without indicating the votes polled by the other political parties, and without indicating the number of accredited voters in the polling units. Justice Nweze said that he recalled that during the election tribunal hearing, Uzodinma had been pressed into admitting that he “hijacked the result sheets from the electoral umpire officials and completed the result sheets by himself.” The judge therefore wondered how the Supreme Court could have “misled itself into declaring Mr. Uzodinma as governor,” in light of such blatant irregularities.

Based on these facts, Justice Nweze said that he was of the view that the application by the PDP and Emeka Ihedioha should succeed. He concluded: “I hereby make an order repealing the decision of this court made on January 14… I also make an order restoring the respondents [Emeka Ihedioha and the PDP] as the winner of the March 9, 2019 governorship election.”

It was all to no avail, however. The majority ruling carried the day, and as it stands Mr. Hope Uzodinma of the All Progressives Congress, by dint of the Supreme Court’s ruling, is confirmed as the governor of Imo State. With the ruling, APC controls 20 of Nigeria’s 36 states at gubernatorial level, PDP 15, and All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) 1 state.

Kinetic Party Politics

The APC’s recapture of Imo State continues the tradition of kinetic party politics in the state. After the Second Republic dominance of the state by the Nigerian People’s Party (NPP) under the governorship of Sam Mbakwe (1979 to 1983), the state was taken by the conservative National Republican Convention (NRC) during the abortive Third Republic, under the governorship of Evan Enwerem (1992 to 1993). Following the return to civilian rule in the Fourth Republic, the PDP governed the state for eight years under Achike Udenwa (1999 to 2007), and afterward under Ikedi G. Ohakim (2007 to 2011) who decamped to the PDP from the Progressive People’s Alliance (PPA) in 2009.

The APC captured the party in 2011 under the helmsmanship of the political carpetbagger, Rochas Okorocha, who seemed to have conjured up a victory in the governorship election of 2011, doing same as well to win a reelection in 2015. Both wins were secured under highly controversial circumstances.

It will be recalled that Rochas Okorochas’ major competitor in the 2015 election had been the former deputy speaker, House of Representatives, Hon. Emeka Ihedioha, who contested under the PDP’s flag. The highly volatile election was deferred for several weeks, with federal authorities citing security concerns. Eventually the election took place on 11 April 2015, but just as with Okorocha’s first election, INEC had declared the 11 April 2015 governorship Imo State governorship polls inconclusive. A re-run was fixed for 25 April 2015 which Okorocha was judged to have won, thereafter governing Imo until 2019.

Emeka Ihedioha’s win in the 2019 government election had brought Imo State back into PDP fold, but in the continuing saga of competitive politics in the state, his apparent victory has now been overturned by a Supreme Court ruling through which an APC candidate, who had been accounted fourth in the initial vote tally, has vaulted into the vaunted governorship seat in Imo State.

Little wonder the bemusement of Justice Nweze, the lone dissenting voice within the Supreme Court panel. He had told his colleagues that the court made a mistake in its initial ruling, arguing that “the finality of the court cannot extinguish the right of any person,” and that the “court [had] a duty of redeeming its image.”

Being outvoted on the panel, however, Justice Nweze concluded with a prediction that “the decision of the Supreme Court in the instant matter will continue to haunt our electoral jurisprudence for a long time to come.”