Court declares Makarfi caretaker committee illegal

A Federal High Court sitting in Abuja on Thursday declared the Senator Ahmed Makarfi-led National Caretaker Committee of the Peoples Democratic Party illegal.
Justice Okon Abang, while ruling in a preliminary application filed by the Ali Modu-Sheriff faction, said that the Makarfi-led faction of the PDP leadership is not legal.
Justice Abang ruled that since two court orders in Lagos and Abuja affirming Modu-Sheriff as the PDP national chairman were still subsisting before another faction rushed to Port-Harcourt to get an order of another court to back the convention that produced Makarfi, it could not stand.
The Sheriff faction of the party had, on July 4, filed an application for an interlocutory injunction, praying the court to stop the national convention of the PDP being planned by the caretaker committee for August 17 in Port Harcourt, Rivers State.
The Modu-Sheriff faction had filed the suit numbered FHC/ABJ/CS/464/2016 for themselves and on behalf of the Executive Committee/National Working Committee of the opposition party.
The suit listed only the Independent National Electoral Commission and the PDP as the defendants.
The plaintiffs had argued that that by virtue of the PDP Constitution, their tenure of ffice would not lapse until 2018.
Modu-Sheriff and the other plaintiffs also urged the court to declare all moves aimed at removing, replacing or conducting fresh elections into their offices as illegal, unlawful, unconstitutional, null and void.