How Benue APC plan to disrupt election petition tribunal from sitting in Makurdi

The Benue state chapter of the APC has reportedly cemented plans to cause riots in strategic locations in Makurdi, the capital city of Benue state, to force the sittings of the State’s Election Petitions Tribunal shifted to Abuja as a result of insecurity.

This is coming barely a week after Nigerian Concord Newspaper unraveled secret plans by stakeholders in the Benue state chapter of the APC to induce the president of the Court of Appeal, Justice Zainab Bulkachuwa, to help the party constitute two panels retrieve the March 23 victory of Governor Samuel Ortom and give it to his APC counterpart, Mr. Emmanuel Jime.

Reports have it that after their defeat in the just concluded elections, the APC chieftains in Benue State have regrouped and vowed to make the state ungovernable to the extents that the Petition Panels will get security reports to shift their sittings to Abuja.

According to inside sources, the planners have set up a committee made up of some APC elders as a think-tank whose mandate it is to execute the plot.

“Their first strategy is to ensure that Hon. John Dyegh is made Speaker, House of Representatives and the defeated Senator George Akume is given a lofty federal appointment. This is to help the APC retain its structures in Benue State and continue to cause problems for Governor Samuel Ortom.

“The second plan of the APC leaders is to cause crisis so much so that the election tribunal will be moved to Abuja to hold its sittings there. The intention of APC is that if the committee sits in Abuja, it will be forced to do the bidding of the party and some of President Buhari’s appointees which is to snatch Governor Ortom’s mandate and hand it to Emmanuel Jime.

“The fear of the APC leaders is that if the tribunal attempts such a thing in Makurdi, there will be crisis of unimaginable consequences” one of the source wrote in a media note to Nigerian Concord.

Recall that after failing to defeat the governor of Benue state, Mr. Samuel Ortom, his predecessor, Dr. Gabriel Suswam,and some other PDP candidates at the last general elections, the Benue state APC under the leadership of Senator George Akume has teamed up with the Alhaji Abba Kyari, Chief of Staff to President Muhammadu Buhari, to get the President of the Court of Appeal, Justice Zainab Adamu Bulkachuwa, to set up two secret Election Petition Panels which will be used to illegally nullify the reelection of Benue state governor-elect.

Dependable sources at the Court of Appeal who hinted Nigerian Concord about the secret move added that other people whose elections had been penciled down for illegal nullifications are Dr. Gabriel Suswam, Hon.Yisa Oker Jev, Richard Gbande, Mzondu and Comrade Abba Moro.

Our sources reliably confirmed that the defeated senator representing Zone B in Benue state, Senator George Akume, had last week in company of Abba Kyari approached Ahaji Adamu Bulkachuwa, the senator-elect for Bauchi North who is also the husband of the Appeal Court President, Justice Zainab Bulkachuwa, to help the Benue APC set up two secret Panels which will be assigned with election petitions that are of interest to the party.

This newspaper gathered that Senator Akume is asking that a secret Panel be set up by Justice Bulkachuwa to rule in favour of Emmanuel Jime and other APC candidates that are of interest including himself as a result of the refusal of Honourable Justice A.A. Adeleye to illegally rule in favour of the APC candidates.

Recall that Justice Adeleye had earlier been appointed by Justice Zainab Bulkachuwa as the head of a Three-member Election Petition Tribunal that was to sit and rule over the governorship election petition filed by Emmanuel Jime.

However, Justice Ademola had told the Benue APC leadership that he was not ready to allow himself to be used for any hatchet job either by the APC or the PDP in Benue state.

He was said to have told Abba Kyari and Senator Akume that it was not possible for him to do their bidding which was to illegally nullify the elections of Samuel Ortom, Gabriel Suswam, Abba Moro, Oker Jev, Richard Gbade, Mark Gbillah and Mzondu.

It was gathered that Abba Kyari had approached an adamant Justice Adeleye to nullify the victories of the PDP candidates in Benue state and then declare that INEC should withdraw their Certificates of Return and give them to Emmanuel Jime, Mimi Orubibi, George Akume, Steven Lawani, Conrad Utaan and other APC candidates.

Realizing that Adeleye was not ready to illegally declare any APC candidate winner, the leadership of the Benue APC ran to Abba Kyari who ensured that Alhaji Adamu Bulkachuwa who has been elected Senator under the umbrella of the APC in Bauchi prevailed over his wife, Justice Zainab Bulkachuwa, to set up two secret Panels that will be paid to upturn the victories of all the PDP candidates who had been declared winners by INEC

Initially according to our sources, members of the two secret Panels which had been set up by Zainab Bulkachuwa were to reside in Lafia, Nasarawa state capital, and be coming to Makurdi in Benue state for their sittings but they have now been moved to Dony Suites in Makurdi where they will be residing till they complete the hatchet jobs.

Other top sources at the Court of Appeal disclosed to Nigerian Concord that Justice Adeleye who was originally inaugurated to head the Election Petitions Tribunal in Benue state will now be left with cases that are of no interest to the APC.

The excuse which Justice Zainab Bulkachuwa is planning to give as reasons behind the formation of the secret Panels is that the petitions were too many for the Justice Adeleye-led Panel to handle within the stipulated 180 days in which judgement must be delivered.

(Credit: Nigerian Concord newspapers)