A senior figure in the African Democratic Congress (ADC), Senator Victor Umeh, has criticised the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) over what he described as interference in the party’s internal affairs, amid an escalating leadership dispute.
Speaking during an interview on Channels Television Politics Today programme on Monday, the senator representing Anambra Central expressed concern over the ongoing turmoil within the coalition party, insisting that recent actions taken by the electoral body have deepened the crisis.
Umeh defended the decision of the faction led by David Mark to seek judicial intervention following INEC’s move to delist the group’s leadership from its official records.
According to him, approaching the courts was both lawful and necessary under the circumstances.
“The truth is that there is no blame on David Mark’s leadership to approach the Court of Appeal with an interlocutory appeal on the Federal High Court’s refusal to throw away the case that the court has no jurisdiction,” he said.
He explained that the question of jurisdiction had been raised from the outset of proceedings at the Federal High Court, stressing that such an issue must be resolved before any substantive matter is considered.
“The issue of jurisdiction was raised at the onset of the Federal High Court. When the issue of jurisdiction is raised, the court must take it and determine it first of all,” Umeh stated.
“If the court has no jurisdiction, it has no business going into the matter ab initio.
”It doesn’t matter how well the court tries the case; if you don’t have jurisdiction, everything you do thereafter will be a nullity, ” he added.
The lawmaker also maintained that the leadership under Mark was justified in challenging the court’s stance.
“When he assumed jurisdiction in the matter, David Mark and his leadership challenged the decision of Justice Nwite’s court that he had no jurisdiction, and they were right,” he added.
Umeh argued that a different outcome would have followed if the appellate court had ruled otherwise on jurisdiction.
“If the Court of Appeal had seen that the Federal High Court had no jurisdiction, it wouldn’t have gone on this long journey,” he said.
“The court would have seen that even the Court of Appeal itself has no jurisdiction to go into the matter involving the internal affairs of a political party, leadership, for example, no jurisdiction.”
The controversy followed INEC’s recent decision to remove David Mark and Rauf Aregbesola from its records as interim National Chairman and National Secretary of the ADC, respectively.
The electoral commission, through its National Commissioner and Chairman of the Information and Voter Education Committee, Mohammed Kudu, said the action was in compliance with a court directive ordering it to maintain the status quo pending the final determination of the case at the trial court.
The development has further intensified the leadership struggle within the ADC, raising fresh concerns about the party’s internal cohesion ahead of future political contests.
