Kashamu: Ogun PDP congress followed due process

Buruji Kashamu, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) gubernatorial candidate in the 2019 elections in Ogun, says the recently held congresses of the party, which produced a new set of party executives in the state, followed due process.

Kashamu stated this in a statement entitled “Setting the records straight on Ogun State PDP executive committee” released in Lagos at the weekend.

According to the former lawmaker, the statement became imperative in light of “falsehood and misinformation being peddled by some people”.

Kashamu said contrary to the lie being bandied in some quarters, that an order was made by Inyang Ekwo, judge of the Abuja division of the federal high court stopping the conduct of PDP congresses in Ogun, there was nothing of such.

He explained that a suit was filed by some people in the name of the PDP against the “authentic” Ogun PDP executive committee seeking a review of the judgment which had ordered that only the said “authentic” Ogun PDP executive committee could conduct congresses or primaries of the PDP in Ogun.

“The reliefs sought were to the effect that the court should decide that because of some Supreme Court Judgments (that allegedly suggest that only the NEC of a political party may conduct congresses and primaries), the judgment in Suit No. FHC/L/CS/636/2016 was not valid in empowering the Ogun State PDP Executive Committee to conduct congresses for its successors in 2020,” he said.

“In that action, they had applied for an order of the court to stop the Ogun State PDP Executive Committee from conducting congresses and the court had refused the application and directed that the Defendants be put on Notice.”

Kashamu said the action was illegal because “It is an invitation to the Federal High Court to sit on appeal over its own judgment delivered in Suit No. FHC/LCS/636/2016 after the appeal against that judgment had been rejected and dismissed at the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court in 2019.

“By March 3, 2020, when this fatally flawed matter came up, a preliminary objection had been filed on behalf of the then Adebayo Dayo-led Ogun State PDP Executive Committee, challenging the jurisdiction of the court to entertain the action because the questions raised in the action had already been decided by the same Federal High Court in favour of the Ogun State PDP Executive Committee in 2019 (in Suit No. FHC/AB/CS/1323/2019.”

The former lawmaker explained further that in the face of the preliminary objection, the court could not and did not entertain any application to stop the conduct of PDP congresses in Ogun state.