The Appeal Court, Enugu on Friday sacked Senator Samuel Anyanwu as the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) National Secretary and declared Ude Okoye as the substantive national secretary.
By the ruling, Okoye is expected to complete the remaining tenure of Anyanwu, as at the time when the incumbent left as the national secretary to run for the governorship election in lmo State.
The Appeal Court affirmed the judgement of the Enugu High Court which had earlier sacked Anyawu as the PDP national secretary and upheld the nomination by the South East PDP caucus which nominated Ude Okoye as Anyawu’s replacement.
The court in a lead judgement delivered by Justice Ridwan Abdullahi, described Anyawu’s claim as the PDP secretary, despite contesting election as the PDP governorship candidate as a grave violation of the party’s constitution and declared that his Appeal against the lower court judgement lacked merit.
Reacting to the development, the Opposition Lawmakers Coalition hailed the judgment, describing it as the dawn of a new era in the PDP and end to the shameless politics of sabotage, betrayal, political materialism and sell-out which Anyawu represents.
The coalition stated that the acting PDP National Chairman, Umar Damagum, who is in same the boat with Anyanwu in the agenda to kill opposition is the next to be ousted from office.
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In a statement signed by the coalition’s spokesman,Rep. Ikenga Ugochinyere, the lawmakers described the judgment as the beginning of the end of Damagum/Anyanwu’s evil politics against the PDP.
He noted that the coalition supports the judgment, pledging loyalty to Ude Okoye as the substantive national secretary.
He said: “We want to salute the courage of the appeal court to have ended this madness by first of all upholding the judgment of the Enugu State High Court that recognizes the decision of South East PDP leaders that nominated Ude Okoye as substantive national secretary to complete the remaining tenure created by the vacancy in the office by the resignation of Samuel Anyanwu as the national secretary when he went to run for governorship.
“The appeal court has restated the principle of the PDP constitution that anyone elected to the executive committee of the party at any level may resign his or her office by giving 30 days’ notice in writing to the executive committee, except in cases of vying for an elective office which shall be effective within the period stipulated by NEC. The law has said that you should resign. When you choose to run for the election, you have chosen to resign.”
