"PDP Can Not Declare Your Seats Vacant!" - Abuja Federal High Court

Justice Ahmed Mohammed of the Federal High Court, Abuja dismissed a fresh motion by the APC lawmakers, asking the high court to suspend its verdict indefinitely to halt moves by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) to declare the seats of all the 51 lawmakers that defected to the All Progressives Congress (APC) vacant. and await the outcome of a referral application they filed before the Appeal Court in Abuja. The judge, however, said that in line with section 68 (1) (g) of the Nigerian Constitution, only the Senate President and Speaker of the House of Representatives had the statutory powers to sack the plaintiffs from office. He dismissed their application as unmeritorious, Justice Mohammed accused the lawmakers of deliberately attempting to ‘arrest’ his judgment six months after hearing was concluded on the matter. On the substantive matter, the high court said it was convinced that the crux of the plaintiffs’ suit bothered on alleged threat by the erstwhile PDP Chairman, Mr Bamanga Tukur, to declare their seats vacant following their defection to the APC. The court held that the fact that PDP do not have the powers to execute such threat (to declare the 51 lawmakers' seats vacant) reduced the suit by the lawmakers to a mere academic exercise (and a waste of the court's time).