Guardian

THERE was a ray of hope early last year that the leadership crises in the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) were finally over. That was when Chief Chekwas Okorie, APGA’s founder and pioneer national chairman, returned the party’s certificate to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).

For many party faithful, this signified an end of the leadership problems that had beleaguered the party since December 15, 2004. There were over 20 lawsuits filed at various courts, including the Supreme Court, between Okorie and Chief Victor Umeh.

However, that ray of hope has faded. The question of who is the rightful national chairman of the APGA has come up yet again, and begging for an answer.

For many years, Umeh had asked Okorie the question. Today, it is Chief Maxi Okwu asking Umeh the same question. Perhaps, the most apt exegesis of the situation is the axiom: “What goes round comes around.”

Umeh’s claim to the leadership of APGA started from an internal issue of accountability and accusations of fraud, which culminated in the expulsion of Okorie and others, including Okwu, and his assumption of power as the national chair of the party.

In between the several court cases, a contest for the leadership of the party between Okorie and Umeh crept into the crisis.

Okorie had warned in a statement that, “no amount of false propaganda will change Umeh’s status from being the former Treasurer of APGA to being the National Chairman of the party without the process of a duly convened National Convention in which he may be elected Chairman.”

But Okorie’s caution did not stop some sections of the public, such as the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and the Judiciary from according Umeh, at one point, the status of acting national chairman of the APGA.

Controversies have trailed Umeh’s emergence, and the present imbroglio playing out is certainly the sum of that confusion, which was uncapped when the Enugu High Court sacked Umeh and the party National Working Committee (NWC).

Ruling on a case brought by Jude Okulie, who asked the court to restrain Umeh from convening any meeting of the party, the Chief Judge of Enugu State, Justice Innocent Umezulike, said the 2006 election that brought in Umeh expired on December 2, 2010, and that the due process of the party’s election was not followed on February 10, 2011 to elect a new executive.

The APGA crises have entered a new phase, with Chief Maxi Okwu, Okorie’s former deputy, once expelled from the party and left to lead the proscribed Citizens Popular Party (CPP), returning to lead the APGA. Was his emergence purely providential or opportunistic, considering the “decapitation” of APGA by Justice Umezulike?

The scheme to bring in Okwu was reportedly concluded at a high-powered meeting in Abuja, with Umeh accusing Governor Peter Obi of hatching the plot to “impose his people on APGA.”

Okwu’s emergence facilitated the April 8, 2013 party convention at the Women Development Centre, Awka, Anambra State, where he polled 764 votes to Chief Joe Martins Uzodike’s 91 votes.

While he declared his election as a new dawn, Okwu was about to have his baptism of fire. As the party delegates were cheering the winner in Awka, the Court of Appeal, sitting in Enugu, that afternoon vacated the order by the Enugu State High Court, which restrained Umeh from parading himself as national chairman.

According to the three-man panel of Justices, since Umeh duly appealed against the decision of the lower court in Enugu, the status quo ought to be maintained pending the determination of the appeal.

But as Umeh was cheering and applauding the Judiciary, Okwu was fuming. “I do not know what the Justices of the Court of Appeal considered, but it is an elementary law that injunctions do not work against completed acts,” Okwu, a lawyer, said. “How can a relief granted around 12:30pm affect an act completed by 8:30am?”

Meanwhile, more court cases were to be Okwu’s lot. A former Anambra State chairman of the APGA went to a State High Court in Ogidi and sought to restrain Okwu and his executive from parading as the new leadership of the party. The substantive suit questions Okwu’s power, as interim national chairman, to dissolve the state party executive prior to his election.

Role of INEC, Judiciary in the crises

THE bid to replace Umeh’s leadership has thrown up more court cases and left INEC shifting the sands like a desert storm. On whose sides have the commission and Judiciary stood in the leadership tussles? Have the courts been open to manipulation, as alleged in many instances? Has INEC really stood by the rule of law in the crises?

When Okorie and others were expelled, the INEC, under the late Chief Abel Guobadia, resisted pressures to recognise the faction led by Umeh. The commission relied on the provisions of Article 19(2) of the party constitution, which stipulates that, “the National Chairman may be removed from office on a vote of no confidence passed by at least two-thirds majority of votes of a National Convention convened solely for the consideration only of such motion.”

In June 2005, Guobadia’s successor, Prof. Maurice Iwu, recognised the Umeh faction and Umeh as the acting national chairman. Did any court grant that request?

But ahead of the Anambra 2010 governorship election, Iwu’s INEC on May 14, 2008 reversed itself through a letter to the Okorie faction, recognising it as the leadership of the party.

INEC relied on Article 18(1) of the APGA constitution, which says: “The founder of the party, Chief Chekwas Okorie, shall hold the office of the national chairman of the party for initial four years and may hold the office for a second term of four years if he so desires.”

The commission claimed that since there was no valid convention where Umeh was elected national chairman of the party, it would continue to deal with Okorie until the courts dispensed all the legal tussles.

Iwu had identified the APGA constitution as the problem with the party, telling the party leaders that unless the constitution was amended, there was no way Umeh would nominate any candidate for the 2010 election in Anambra. Of course, the party never amended it.

The development had put the Umeh faction in a tight corner, as the commission handed the nomination forms for the governorship election to the Okorie faction. The loser was going to be Governor Obi, who was seeking re-election. It took the intervention of the Presidency to resolve the confusion.

In 2009, following the recognition of the Okorie faction, the Umeh faction dragged Iwu and INEC to an Abuja High Court, alleging contempt of court. The case was struck out.

Based on the recognition by INEC, Okorie’s faction held a national convention in Abuja in 2009, expelled Obi and Umeh, and re-admitted Okorie and re-elected him as national chairman.

However, on January 13, 2010, the Court of Appeal in Abuja upheld Okorie’s expulsion from the APGA and he could not secure an order of mandamus to compel INEC to obey the court judgment on the national convention.

With the Supreme Court judgment that ended Okorie’s battle to upturn his expulsion from the party, INEC, in an August 31, 2010 letter signed by the Secretary of the Commission, Abdulahi A. Kaugama and addressed to Umeh as the national chairman of APGA, stated that it would relate with Umeh as well as Alhaji Sani Shinkafi, the national secretary.

When Prof. Attahiru Jega took over from Iwu, Umeh demanded that the commission should resume full and formal relationship with his leadership of the APGA in view of the various courts rulings, which had validated the expulsion of Okorie.

But does INEC confer leadership on a party? If not, who is the national chairman of the APGA — Umeh or Okwu? Both are relying on validly held conventions, the court interpretations and INEC.

In establishing his tenure, Okwu, in a letter dated March 11, 2013, invited INEC, rationalising the need for the national convention. Although INEC authorised and supervised the convention, Okwu, like many other APGA faithful, was shocked when the commission noted that it would only deal with the Umeh-led executive. Why?

INEC, in a letter by Kaugama, explained that the decision was based on the ruling of the Court Appeal in Enugu, which ordered a stay of execution on the order of the Enugu High Court, which had sacked the Umeh-led NEC.

Umeh applauded INEC and noted that the commission had continued in its efforts to do everything as a public institution to preserve the rule of law.

“With this recognition from INEC, it becomes clear that APGA does not have a factional chairman, the party has only one chairman, which is recognised by the commission, the party’s constitution as well as the Constitution,” Umeh said.

In the face of accusations that INEC is guilty of double standards and inconsistency with the APGA, Anambra State Commissioner for Special Duties, Mr. Vincent Ezenwajiaku, described the electoral body as “only an election administration and regulatory institution and not a court of law.”

He said the recognition of Umeh by INEC was an “administrative convenience based on the Appeal Court ruling,” noting that the same commission authorised and witnessed the April 8, 2013 APGA convention in Awka.

Where is APGA headed?

THE registration of APGA on June 24, 2002 was welcomed in the Southeast as a platform for Ndigbo to negotiate political power at the centre. But that dream has not materialised.

The closest it came was during the 2003 polls when the late Dim Emeka Odumegwu-Ojukwu, the party’s candidate, took a distant third in the presidential election.

In the zone, the party has managed to win the governorship in Anambra and Imo States and a number of seats in the National Assembly. The PDP even controls the legislature in Anambra.

There is nothing dominant about APGA’s performance so far despite the immense goodwill the party enjoys. A few chieftains will deny that the long years of legal battle was a factor that had set the party backward.

After the record setting tussles in the courts between Umeh and Okorie, the immediate question is how long will Umeh and Okwu sustain the blossoming leadership contest? And will APGA survive this one?

Certainly, the party will continue to suffer as long as the leadership crisis persists. Those who expected the exit of Okorie to signal a lease of life for APGA will be wondering what is going on. Was Okorie really the problem of the party? Will the coming of Okwu end the problem?

The survival of APGA has been down to the sentiments in the Southeast and nothing to do with the organisation of the party. In Imo, it became the platform for the sacking of the unpopular PDP government of Ikedi Ohakim. Today, the Imo Governor, Owelle Rochas Anayo Okorocha, is romancing with the yet-to-be-registered All Progressives Congress (APC). Is this an indication that the APGA has lost Imo?

For the party, under Okwu or Umeh, the urgent test is not in the 2015 elections; it is in the Anambra governorship election in 2014. Will the party retain the state?

Umeh has dismissed threats of any party dislodging the APGA in the Southeast. “APGA is not in any contest with any other party in the Southeast,” he said. “The Southeast is a safe ground for APGA. The result of the 2011 election shows a contest between APGA and the PDP… The influence of APGA in the zone is such that the governor of Imo described APGA as a religion of the people of the Southeast.”

The question remains: Where is APGA headed? Today, the leaders are heading in only one direction: the courts. The latest ruling of an Awka High Court upholding the April 8, 2013 convention of the party, has laid the stage for possibly another round of suits.

What will INEC do now? Will it revert its decision and recognise Okwu as the national chairman? Will a higher court contradict the ruling and open yet more suits?