The Federal High Court in Abuja on Friday dismissed a suit from the Adolphus Wabara-led Board of Trustees (BoT) of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP). They wanted the court to order the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to recognize their faction.
Justice Salim Ibrahim called the suit “an abuse of court process, unmeritorious and lacking in merit.” He stated that the plaintiffs did not prove their case.
Justice Ibrahim agreed with INEC's preliminary objection that the court did not have the authority to handle this case.
He confirmed the leadership of the Mohammed Abdulrahman-led PDP faction, which supports FCT Minister Nyesom Wike. He said, “the preliminary objections filed by all the defendants succeed.”
The judge also removed PDP as the 8th plaintiff in the suit. He agreed with the Abdulrahman-led faction's claim that the first to seventh plaintiffs had no right to file on behalf of the party.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the Wabara-led BoT had filed this new suit. They wanted the court to force INEC to recognize the PDP interim National Working Committee (NWC) led by National Chairman Kabir Turaki on its official website, among other things.
They mentioned that they sent the names of Kabir Turaki's NWC members to INEC in letters dated May 4.
NAN reports that the originating summons, marked: FHC/ABJ/CS/1159/2026, was filed on June 4 by lawyers led by Chief Chris Uche, SAN.
The plaintiffs in the suit include former Senate President Wabara, BoT Secretary and former Governor Muazu Babangida Aliyu of Niger State, ex-Minister of Information Jerry Gana, and PDP chief Olabode George.
Others are former Minister of Women Affairs Maryam Ciroma, ex-Minister of Women Affairs and Social Development Zainab Maina, and BoT member and NEC member Esther Uduehi, along with the PDP itself.
They named INEC as the only defendant in the suit. But the PDP faction loyal to the FCT minister challenged the court's authority to hear the case.
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