Abuja – Constitutional Lawyer and Human Rights Activist,
Chief Mike Ozekhome has hailed the judgment of the
Supreme Court on who qualifies to be the authentic
leadership of the People’s Democratic Party saying the
judgment has saved Nigeria’s slide into a despotic one-
party state.
Ozekhome also posited that by the judgment, the
judiciary, which had been the ‘whipping boy’ of our
democracy, has again saved ‘Nigeria’s wobbling and
imperiled democracy’.
In a statement titled ‘The Intervention of the Supreme
Court in Resolving the PDP Crisis’, Chief Ozekhome said,
“The apex court of Nigeria in its unanimous judgment
today (Wednesday) did two refreshingly invigorating
things.
“First, it saved Nigeria’s destructive and annihilating slide
into an autocratic and despotic one-party state, where
absolutism and lack of opposition were already rearing
their monstrous visages.
“Secondly, it saved, unarguably, the most potent
opposition, the PDP, from self -destruct and internally
generated volcanic eruption”.
Continuing Ozekhome said, “There is no doubt that the
Ahmed Makarfi and Modu Sheriff Factions were apples
and oranges, when compared on an imaginary scale of
geniuness.
“One was Japanese, the other, Taiwanese, in terms of
originality and imitation.
“While the Makarfi faction appeared to have been fighting
for the survival and wellness of the heart and soul of the
vertically and horizontally fractured party, which once
imperiously boasted of ruling Nigeria for over 60 years in
a stupor state of power inebriation, Modu Sheriff and his
faction were bent on destroying it completely.
“It must have made the ruling APC green with envy in
terms of the Sheriff’s huge capacity to exert maximum
damage to PDP’s corporate existence.
“Have you ever seen a supposed opposition party
fraternizing with and eulogizing the ruling party on every
step taken, never criticizing it, yet tongue lashing its own
party?
Have you ever seen where a warring faction became
allergic to a settlement that would raise its party up from
its nadir of doldrums?
“Once again, the judiciary, the whipping ‘boy’ of our
democracy, has risen to the challenge of saving Nigeria’s
wobbling and imperiled democracy.
“A virile opposition constitutes the heart and soul of
democracy. The alternative is dictatorship. God bless
Nigeria.”
