Supreme Court Has Rendered PDP Powerless, Ex- Chair
2 min read
Chiemeka ADINDU, Calabar
A former state chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP in Cross River state, Ntufam John Okon has lamented that the Supreme Court has deprived the party of its statutory right of choosing its candidates for elections.
He said this in response to the ruling of the Supreme Court recently which affirmed that of the appeal court that Jarigbe Agom Jarigbe was the party’s flag bearer in the December 5, 2020 bye-election in Cross River North Senatorial District.
Okon who spoke with TNN over the telephone said the only option left was to accept the judgment in good fate as both Dr. Steven Odey and Jarigbe Agom Jarigbe were members of the PDP. He called on the duo to unite so as to move the party forward.
He said: “The Supreme Court has said it and we just have to obey it but, the good thing is that at least it was a split decision. We wrote to find out the details but the challenge we now had is that they have deprived the political party of their powers to choose candidates, because if a political party chose a candidate and all these things happenned you just have to know that the party’s influence is reduced.
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“Again, if you remember Hope Uzodinma of Imo state how he was number eight and he becomes number one so with all those things you just have to accept it in good fate and pray that democracy is not affected, that’s my own opinion.
“But well, it’s an internal party matter, Steven Odey is a PDP member, Jarigbe Agom Jarigbe is a PDP member so what we have to do is to ask them to unite and reconcile themselves so that PDP can move ahead, especially in Northern Cross River, that’s my advice. Already there was a court of appeal decision so if they said his appeal lacks merit and struck it out, let’s just let the sleeping dog lie”.
