Forty-eight hours after the screening committee of the All Progressives Congress, APC, disqualified the Edo State Governor, Mr. Godwin Obaseki, from participating in the Edo State Governorship primaries, the crisis rocking the party is far from abating. It is also unlikely that the National Chairman of the party, Comrade Adams Oshiomhole, will be sleeping easy any time soon.
This is because the Court of Appeal, sitting in Abuja, Tuesday, upheld his suspension as National Chairman of the APC, ruling that his appeal against an earlier ruling by the lower court lacked merit.
A three-member panel of the appellate court headed by Mr. Justice Mohammed Lamido dealt the blow on Oshiomhole.
The panel affirmed the decision of an Abuja high court which, early March, ordered Oshiomhole’s suspension as APC national chairman.
There has been no love lost between Oshiomhole and his political godson, Godwin Obaseki. The ding dong between the duo thickened early in the year as the Edo State chapter of the APC pulled the rug off his feet, suspending him from the party.
A Federal High Court had affirmed that the chairman’s suspension was legal and ordered him to stop parading himself as APC national chairman.
Though the Court of Appeal had initially voided the suspension and the granted a stay of execution of the high court’s order.
But the appellate court, on Tuesday, held that Oshiomhole’s suspension was in order, thus introducing a new dimension to the roiling crisis in the party.
Prior to the ruling, Governor Obaseki, had been flirting with some chieftains of the opposition Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, notably Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers State, fuelling speculations that he may be heading to the PDP.
Prior to the ruling, Obaseki, same Tuesday, had, announced he was quitting the APC but would announce his next destination after a scheduled meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari in Abuja.
