PH Mundial – Port Harcourt Online Newspaper News Across The Region
Related Articles
… Allege Judge ‘on Mission to Destroy Their Political Destinies’
By Godwin Chukwumaechi, Port Harcourt
Candidates of the All Progressives Congress for National Assembly seats in the 2023 general elections in Rivers State, on Monday staged a protest against Justice Stephen Daylop-Pam of the Federal High Court Port Harcourt, over his alleged refusal to recuse himself from a matter involving them and the Rivers State chapter of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP).
The APC candidates’ action followed the alleged refusal of the presiding judge to put on record complaints arising from the defendants’ petition, as announced by Ezemonye Ezekiel-Amadi, who appeared for himself.
When the matter was mentioned in court, counsel to the People’s Democratic Party, Den Nwigwe, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), informed the court of issues of service of court process.
But when Ezemonye Ezekiel-Amadi who is the APC candidate for Ikwerre-Emohua Federal Constituency reminded the judge of his and other candidates’ petition against him, the judge could not take record of the information but went ahead to adjourn till September 20, 2022 for hearing.
Addressing newsmen outside the courtroom alongside other candidates, Ezekiel-Amadi said Justice Daylop-Pam’s action has again proven their earlier alarm that the judge is allegedly on a mission to destroy their political destinies.
The candidate who is the 12th defendant in the suit said; “I brought to the attention of His Lordship my pending petition and supported by the other defendants asking him to recuse himself and he refused to entertain it at all, instead he adjourned the matter to some day in September for hearing.
“That is distasteful to me both as a litigant and as a lawyer. From day one, we have been saying that he is on a mission to destroy our political career. He has some vested interest in the matter. Everyday this matter comes up in court, those who have been following will see the sign of what we have been saying.
“Usually, when a judge has a matter and he was asked to recuse himself, that petition must be attended to because just like the issue of jurisdiction, it goes to the root of the jurisdiction to hear the matter. If I don’t have confidence in a court to hear my matter, then there is nothing the court should do other than recuse himself and send back the file for reassignment if there is no vested interest.
“But every day we come to court here it gets clearer that Justice Delyop-Pam actually has some vested interest in this matter that is why he is insisting to hear the matter and not take it back for reassignment”.
On his part Asita Honourable Asita stated; “We have respect for the institution. A judge should stop this continuous adjournment, what is he adjourning for, we said leave our matter because if he hears the matter now and he decides in our favour the ordinary impression will be because we petitioned, if he rules against us we will not take it because it justifies the suspension we have had.
“We are saying that he should leave our case, there are so many judges in the Federal High Court. We are not saying give us judgement but that we do not have confidence in you. We are begging him now to remove his hand from our case”.
