The judgment in a suit filed by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) against Governor Ben Ayade of Cross River will be delivered on Friday by a Federal High Court sitting in Abuja.
The PDP, through its counsel Emmanuel Ukala, SAN, had filed the suit marked: FHC/ABJ/CS/975/2021 before Justice Taiwo Taiwo to seek for an order sacking the governor and his deputy over their defection to the All Progressives Congress (APC), among others.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the judgment in suit number: FHC/ABJ/CS/975/2021 filed by the PDP against Cross River governor and his deputy would be delivered on Friday, which is already creating tension in the state.
On Monday, Justice Taiwo had ordered the two House of Representatives members representing Cross River and 18 lawmakers from the state’s House of Assembly to vacate their seats over their defection to APC.
He gave the order following a suit marked: FHC/ABJ/CS/971/2021 filed on Aug. 27, 2021, by the PDP to challenge the 20 lawmakers’ defection to APC, alongside the governor on May 20, 2021.
Justice Taiwo, in the judgment, dismissed the defence argument that the PDP (plaintiff) had no locus standi (legal rights) to institute the case.
He also dismissed other preliminary objections raised by the sacked lawmakers.
Taiwo ruled that the argument of the lawmakers that there was rancour in the PDP which necessitated their defection to APC was a ploy to mislead the court.
The judge, who granted all the reliefs sought by the PDP, held that it was disheartening that politicians in the country treated citizens as if they did not matter once they (lawmakers) got into office.
“A day must surely come when elected officials, must either resign from their office or ask the people who voted for them before defecting to other political parties, instead of defecting to another party without recourse to the law and the citizens,” he had said.
Meanwhile the lawmakers have filed an appeal against the ruling.