From: GODWIN TSA Abuja
Thursday, November 25, 2010

The ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) yesterday told an Abuja High Court that as a sitting president, Dr. Goodluck Jonathan has the constitutional right to contest election in 2011 by virtue of the fact that he has not exhausted his second term in office.

Besides, the party said section 42 of the 1999 constitution protects him against any form of discrimination based on his geographical zone, tribe, religion and political affiliation.

These were the submissions of the PDP and President Jonathan in the suit brought against them by a member of the party, Cyriacus Njoku, who is asking the court to stop the president from participating in the presidential primaries because the presidency had been zoned to the North.

Meanwhile, the court presided over by the Chief Judge of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Justice Lawal Gummi, would on December 1, this year, deliver its judgment on the case.
On the same date, judgment has also been fixed on a similar case instituted by a presidential aspirant of the party, Alhaji Dustinma, who is contesting the decision of President Jonathan to contest the election on the basis of the zoning arrangement of the party.

At the resumed hearing of the case yesterday, counsel to the PDP, Chief. Olushola Oke who is the legal Adviser of the party prayed the court to dismiss the suit on the grounds that it was incompetent and not within the jurisdiction of the court. In his preliminary objection to the suit, the PDP attacked the locus standi of the plaintiff to file the action while also contending that the subject matter of the suit was purely a domestic affair of the party and urged the court not to intervene in the party’s internal affairs.

The legal adviser told the court that under section 137 (1) (b) of the 1999 constitution, a sitting president was allowed to run for a re- election so far as he had not exhausted his second term in office. Besides, he said the plaintiff had, by virtue of not meeting up with his financial obligations to the party, by implication, forfeited his membership of the party.

He further argued that the plaintiff did not show the court that his peculiar interest would suffer if Jonathan was allowed to contest the election and accordingly urged the court to not only dismiss the case but also the claim of the plaintiff.
In his objection, President Jonathan urged the court to throw out the suit on the basis that the court lacked jurisdiction to hear the case.

The president, who was represented by Chief Alex Izinyon (SAN), described the plaintiff as a meddlesome interloper and busybody who had no requisite legal rights (Locus Standi) to institute the case. While emphasising that the matter was a domestic affair of the party, he urged the court to decline its jurisdiction and to dismiss the suit as well as the claim of the plaintiff.

Earlier, Counsel to the plaintiff, Ugochukwu Osuagwu, prayed the court to dismiss the preliminary objections for not meeting up the statutory requirements, especially section 87 of the Evidence Act and Order 7 rule 3 of the High Court rules. But when the court overruled him, he asked for an adjournment to file a written reply to the objections and it was granted.