7th April 2026, Law And Society, Governance And Development, Politics News
Photo/Source: Channels Television

A chieftain of African Democratic Congress, ADC, and lawmaker representing Anambra Central Senatorial District at the National Assembly, Senator Victor Umeh, has contributed his views on the ongoing leadership crisis in the party, maintaining that
Senator David Mark was not wrong when he approached the Court of Appeal with an interlocutory appeal on the Federal High Court’s refusal to throw away the case over a plea that it lacked jurisdiction to handle the party’s internal matter.

Umeh said this in an interview on Channels Television’s Politics Today.

It would be recalled that INEC, last week, announced that it had delisted Senator Mark and Rauf Aregbesola from its records as Interim National Chairman and Interim National Secretary respectively. The commission, through its National Commissioner and Chairman of the Information and Voter Education Committee, Mohammed Kudu, said “the decision was taken in line with a court order directing it to maintain the status quo pending the final determination of the matter at the trial court.”

Responding to the development, Senator Umeh said: “The truth is that there is no blame on David Mark’s leadership to approach the court of appeal with an interlocutory appeal on the Federal High Court’s refusal to throw away the case that the court has no jurisdiction.

“The issue of jurisdiction was raised at the onset of the Federal High Court. When the issue of jurisdiction is raised, the court must take it and determine it first of all.

“If the court has no jurisdiction, it has no business going into the matter ab initio.

“It doesn’t matter how well the court tries the case; if you don’t have jurisdiction, everything you do thereafter will be a nullity,” he said.

He added: “When he assumed jurisdiction in the matter, David Mark and his leadership challenged the decision of Justice Nwite’s court that he had no jurisdiction, and they were right.”

Umeh also said: “If the Court of Appeal had seen that the Federal High Court had no jurisdiction, it wouldn’t have gone on this long journey.

“The court would have seen that even the Court of Appeal itself has no jurisdiction to go into the matter involving the internal affairs of a political party,” Umeh said.

~ Published By NewsOrient Network

For News, Inter
views, Special Events Coverage, Advertisements, Corporate Reports, etc., Contact:
Email: Newsorientng@gmail.com

Website: https://newsorientng.com
Phone: +2348023165410; +2348064041541