Federal High Court Strikes out AD Application against APC

Source: pointblanknews.com

…As Falana leads new battle to stall APC.

A federal high court sitting in Abuja on Thursday threw out the application by a faction of the Alliance for Democracy (AD) seeking to be joined in the suit against the African Peoples Congress (APC).

Justice Gabriel Kolawale of court 5 on the suit of African People's Congress (APC) in his ruling said the application smacked of an intent to delay a substantive case involving the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and the political group, APC.

The political group, APC had gone to court in the wake of the Independent National Electoral Commission’s (INEC) refusal to register them as a political party. They had filed for registration with INEC using the acronym APC which was later presented before the electoral commission by the merging APC.

However, the AD had applied to join the suit, demanding that the political group should not be registered by INEC.

Justice Kolawole however described the application of AD as frivolous, abuse of court process and a calculated attempt by the applicant to waste the time of the court as they did not show any cause of action. The court struck out the application immediately.Drama displayedHowever, shortly after the ruling, a new group Peoples Socialist Movement moved another motion to be joined as defendant in the suit. The judge was infuriated by the numerous applications by different groups to be joined, he warned the lawyer of the new group that if he discovers that the application is frivolous like that of the AD he will award cost on the lawyer personally.

The lawyer who became mute for few seconds and was confused whether to withdraw the application or not reluctantly moved it as his action was seen to at least justify his presence in court.Meanwhile, The judge who upon going through the case file saw undated motion filed by Femi Falana (SAN) for another group bearing the name African people's congress claiming to be a non-governmental organization, seeking a stay of proceedings by the court as they have filed their notice of appeal in the court of appeal.

The group sought to quash the decision of the federal high court in granting the plaintiffs leave to seek judicial review against INEC. The judge descended heavily on the application of Femi Falana saying that it was smuggled into his file without a date on it and served on only the plaintiffs without serving INEC. he further warned that nobody can use the court processes to delay him from hearing the substantive suit, he said that politicians should not use his court to play politics and that INEC should beware that the case is properly before him that in the event they go ahead to register anybody with the acronym (APC) that it will not stop him from delivering his judgment in due course. The judge adjourned the ruling of the applications of the People's Socialist Movement and Femi Falana to  the 18th of July 2013.