The Senate has reacted to a court order stopping it from re-
amending the Electoral Act 2022 recently signed by President
Muhammadu Buhari.

The Senate on Tuesday challenged the ruling by a Federal
High Court in Abuja.

Senate President Ahmad Lawan, who made this assertion on
the floor at plenary, said the judiciary cannot stop the National
Assembly from performing its constitutionally assigned duties.

“The judiciary, cannot stop the National Assembly from
performing its duties,” Lawan said.

The court, in a ruling delivered by Justice Inyang Ekwo,
specifically barred all the defendants in the suit marked FHC/
ABJ/CS/247/2022, from removing section 84 (12) of the
Electoral Act or preventing it from being implemented for the
purpose of the 2023 general elections.

The defendants in the suit are; the Attorney General of the
Federation and Minister of Justice, Senate President, Speaker
of the House of Representatives, Clerk to the National
Assembly, Senate Leader, House of Representatives Leader
and the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC.

Others are; Deputy Senate President, Deputy Speaker, House of
Representatives, Deputy Senate Leader and Deputy Leader of
the House of Representatives.

President Muhammadu Buhari, before he signed the Electoral
Act Amendment Bill 2022 into law, asked the National
Assembly to expunge section 84 (12) of the Act, which he
argued would disenfranchise serving political appointees.

The section specifically made it mandatory that political office
holders must firstly resign from office before they could vie for
any elective position.

The court order reads: “No political appointee at any level shall
be a voting delegate or be voted for at the convention or
congress of any political party for the purpose of the
nomination of candidates for any election.”

The PDP, in the substantive suit it filed through its team of
lawyers led by Chief Ogwu Onoja, SAN, challenged the legality
or otherwise of the National Assembly tinkering with the
Electoral Act, after it had been signed into law by the
President.