STATEMENT
NATIONAL CHAIRMAN OF THE LABOUR PARTY, BARRISTER JULIUS ABURE DISMISSES HIS PURPOTED SUSPENSION BY THE FCT HIGH COURT, SAYS HE IS STILL IN CHARGE
My attention has been drawn to the news making the round that the court yesterday suspended me as the National Chairman of the Labour Party. That is far from the truth and the figment of the imaginations of Lamidi Apapa and his cohorts
What happened was that we raised objection to the entire suit they filed and the ex-parte order and the court assumed jurisdiction on the matter.
That was what happened and for Apapa to address a press conference and be misinforming people and carrying out propaganda that I was suspended by the court simply shows the height of their desperation. I need to make it abundantly clear that the substantive matter has not even started.
We have submitted our notice of appeal to the court and we are moving all the matters from that court and taking it to the court of Appeal.
This same court in FCT in 2023 in the case of Sulieman v APC did thesame thing and the Law Report decided by the Supreme Court overruled and also made it very clear that the court has no jurisdiction over such matters. Supreme Court subsequently affirmed the position of the Appeal Court. So when my Lord assumed jurisdiction, even though it was obvious he lacked jurisdiction.
The lower court
however never suspended me in its ruling. This is why I was surprised to read from the social media the jaundiced interpretation offered to the media by Apapa after he addressed the newsmen.
His address simply showed that time is running out fast on them and that they are in a hurry to achieve their target set by their paymasters. Is it not laughable that he will be giving ultimatum to the counsels to Labour Party and our Presidential candidate, Peter Obi to within 48 hours to surrender themselves to him. He was obviously asleep when the ruling was ongoing or that he does not understand the difference between a court ruling and a judgement. He needs to be schooled on some of these legal terminologies.
We have raised an alarm earlier of plots to scuttle our cases at the Presidential Election Tribunal. The latest development is that Apapa has detailed another lawyer procured by the APC paymasters to appear for Labour Party before the tribunal on the next adjourned sitting, being Wednesday May 17. Apapa also will appear as representing the party on same date at the court. This actions are geared towards creating the impression of a factionalized party. We are calling on the police and DSS to prevent the planned desecration of the court by these paid agents.
We took special notice of the tweet by the Special Adviser to the President-elect on Media Mr Bayo Onanuga on Friday where he hailed the purpoted emergence of their hireling, Apapa and for properly interpreting the roles scripts assigned to him. In his tweet Onanuga refered Apapa as the man who controls Labour Party affairs and that “the order will send chills down the spines of Obi and his lawyers as Apapa wants all cases withdrawn. Interesting times.” We want to tell Onanuga and his co-jesters that their celebration will soon be cut short and their laughter will soon turn to weeping.
Let me at this juncture tell the likes of Apapa, Onanuga and their cohorts that Labour party is a democratic institution and you don’t use coup d’ tat to grab leadership, you don’t use the back door to take over the leadership of the party. That is what Apapa and co tried to do. Though we understand them because they have been paid by their paymasters. If you look at the statement they made yesterday, they were talking about the tribunal. Whatever they said is about the tribunal, and it is no longer news that these disgruntled and disgraced Labour Party members have been paid to truncate the cases in the tribunal. .
We all know how to remove the National Chairman, and how a new one can be elected. So it unfortunate that this group of people found themselves in the Labour Party. The time has come for us to separate the wheat from the chaff.
The party was a small party and because we want to have numbers, we accommodated all forms of charlatans and dubious people into the party. These are people who didn’t offer anything to the party. Apapa scored zero in Oyo state in the Presidential election. Arabambi who is claiming to be the Publicity Secretary scored zero in Ogun state in the presidential election. They even supported other candidates from other parties. In Edo, We scored 79 percent of the votes in the presidential election.
In the governorship election and House of Assembly election, in spite of the dollars and harassment that were deployed by the PDP government, I am the only national chairman that won my ward. My performances as the national chairman of this party is not in doubt. I inherited a party that was in arears of salary payment, a party that has no image and today I have made the party number one party in Nigeria.
In this party, I have paid my dues. I have been here for 20 years building this party and today the party has become one to reckon with in Nigeria. So for these hirelings to say they want to take over the party, we laugh at them. And I urge Nigerians to ignore them because whatever information they are getting from them are fake news.
I want to reassure you that we are in control and I remain the national chairman. I assure you that we continue to provide leadership. Our cases in court, we will continue to defend them. Our House of Reps and senatorial cases, we will continue to defend them until victory is assured. Same goes for the presidential election tribunal. No amount of distraction will stop us from attaining our aspirations.
SIGN
Barrister Julius Abure
National Chairman
Labour Party
