Election Stalemate: Drama in Court as Lawyer,Judge Exchange Hot Words
By Amos Odhe.
A mild drama in form of a heated argument that took everyone by surprise ensued penultimate Tuesday at the Bayelsa State Judiciary when the presiding Judge of High Court 2 Justice M A Ayemieye and Counsel to a candidate for the Chairmanship position of Sagbama Local Government Area, Barr.Ebimobowei G Okele exchanged hot words in the course of a disagreement in the ongoing case in the Court.
The bone of contention between the judge who incidentally is currently the Acting Chief Judge in the state hovered around the appropriateness or otherwise of a Writ of Summon the Bailiff, engaged by Barr. Okele had actually served the State’s Chapter of Peoples Democratic Party- PDP one of the defendants in the case the writ of summon.
It could be recalled that shortly after the postponement of the state’s LGA government election initially scheduled to hold on the 14th of May, 2022, three months before the expiration of the tenure of the immediate past elected local government administrators, the flag bearer of the Allied Peoples Movement- APM, for the Chairmanship position of Sagbama LGA, Hon Tombra Kelvin Teibowei, dragged the Bayelsa State Independent Electoral Commission- BYSIEC and the State Chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party- PDP to Court.
Prayers sought for by the claimant against the claimants include, among others, an order compelling BYSIEC to fix a date to organize the postponed election, an order stopping BYSIEC from including PDP in the said election on account of the allegation that it did not conduct any Primary nor submitted names of candidates at the close of submission of such on 15th March, 2022.
Another relief sought for by the claimant is an order directing the 1st Defendant- BYSIEC to publish names of nominated candidates of Political Parties that have been submitted before the said deadline.
Meanwhile, ever since the case NO YHC /58/2022 was filed on behalf of the claimant by Barr E G Okele of
D D Fiderikumo, Okele & Co Legal Practitioners on 7th July, 2022, the case have been subjected to a series of adjournments because of none appearance of the Defendants nor their legal representatives at any of the Court’s sitting.
A sudden twist in the tale however occurred when almost a year after,
the 2nd Defendant’-PDP’s lawyer appeared claiming that they have not been coming to Court because his client, PDP, had not received any service to that effect.
The war of words that flowed between the trial judge, Justice Ayemieye and Barr Okele over the fact or otherwise of the Bailiff’s delivery to the 2nd Defendant which the Bailiff allegedly swore an affidavit to was so tense until it eventually eased out when a decision was agreed upon for the Bailiff to appear in Court in it’s next sitting and be in the witness box to testify whether PDP was indeed served writ of summons or not.
Meanwhile as at the time of going to Press, the State government, our correspondent gathered, has already stepped up plans to appoint Caretaker Committees to handle the affairs of the respective 8 LGA’ s in the State.
Pix of the APM candidate. Hon Tombra Teibowei
