36 Defected APC Reps petition NJC

By Umar Muhammad Puma

Thirty-six lawmakers who decamped from the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the House of Representatives, to the All Progressives Congress (APC) have dragged Justice Adeniyi Ademola, of the Federal High Court, Abuja before the National Judicial Council (NJC).

The lawmakers, in their petition, said Justice Ademola has commited acts of judicial misconduct while adjudicating on suit, FHC/ABJ/CS/4/2014 filed by Peoples Democratic Party to challenge defection of its former members in the House of Representatives.

It would be recalled that Justice Adeniyi Ademola, in his judgment on March 31, 2014 in a suit filed by the PDP after the defection of its lawmakers initially gave the APC a majority in the House of Representatives, declared that the defected legislators were not competent to sponsor, contribute or vote on any motion calling for a change in the leadership of the House, that there was no division within the ranks of PDP according to Section 68 (1) (g) of the Constitution to warrant the lawmakers from defecting and continuing to hold on to their seats.

The petitioners claimed that the suit only sought to stop members of the House of Representatives who defected from PDP to APC from changing leadership of the House and expressed surprise that the Judge veered off to cases not canvassed before him and became more political than plaintiff (PDP).

The APC lawmakers, in their 8-page petition to NJC urged the council to investigate Justice Adeniyi Ademola in his bid to cleanse the judiciary; while they also stated that they “owe it a duty to the Nigerian judiciary and the state to report what we consider as travesty of justice occasioned by a judge whose disposition from the onset of the case showed undiluted bias”.

The lawmakers concluded that “the judgment of Justice Ademola and orders he made and the passing comments were clearly politically motivated and did not demonstrate legal jurisprudential erudition”.