An Imo State High Court, presided over by Justice Benjamin Iheka, has restrained the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), its agents and servants from, “in any manner whatsoever, excluding the Plaintiffs/Applicants (former local government chairmen and councillors) from participating in and voting during the state party congress and the national convention, through which the party’s candidate for the 2019 general elections will emerge, pending the hearing and determination of the Motion on Notice dated September 1, 2018, and filed September 4, 2018.”
Similarly, the court equally restrained the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), “by itself and through its appointees, agents and servants, from accepting any list of candidates submitted to it by the first defendant (PDP), other than one whose voters are drawn from the List of Voters to the State Party Congress and the National Convention, pending the hearing and determination of the Motion on Notice for Interlocutory Injunction, filed on September 11, 2018.”
Justice Iheka, thereafter, fixed the return date for October 17, 2018.
It would be recalled that former local government chairmen and councillors, including Dr Bede Nzenwa, Chief Emma Odor and 18 others had, in suit number HOW/671/2018, sought, among other things, the court’s interpretation of the PDP Constitution, as amended in 2017.
The plaintiffs averred that they “are being unconstitutionally and unlawfully excluded from the list of those to participate in, and vote at the stat party congress and national convention of the first defendant, PDP.”