No Motion to Stay action on tenure of five governors

234NEXT

21 March 2011

No Motion to Stay action on tenure of five governors

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), may have deceived Nigerians when it claimed that it had pleaded with the Federal High Court in Abuja to allow it conduct governorship elections in the five states that the court earlier ruled there will be no election.

In a judgment on February 23, Adamu Bello, a Federal High Court judge, ruled that governorship elections should not hold in Kogi, Sokoto, Adamawa, Cross River and Bayelsa states until next year.

However, the Commission recently claimed that it asked the court to stop the execution of its judgment. In a motion for stay allegedly filed by its lawyer, Carol Ajie, INEC reportedly asked the court to stop the governors from benefiting from the judgment until the Appeal Court decides the appeal it against the judgment.

“But if this application is granted by this court, the appellant would perform its statutory duties of conducting elections in the affected states as well others and the opportunity of a level playing ground afforded to other candidates.,” INEC stated in the petition.

Ms Ajie said if the application was refused, any decision arrived at by the Court of Appeal would have been rendered nugatory by the ruling that extended the tenure of the five governors.

Findings at the court registry over the weekend, however, showed that there was no motion for stay before Mr. Bello.

When asked to confirm the date the motion for stay of execution will be heard, the Court Registrar, having gone through his record, said there was no such motion for stay of execution, stressing that a declarative judgment cannot be stayed.