The suspended National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Prince Uche Secondus, has instructed lawyers to study the ruling of the Court of Appeal, Port Harcourt, which dismissed his motion to halt the National Convention of the party in order to appeal it “immediately”.
Secondus, while reacting Friday through his media aide, Ike Abonyi, said no abuse of the constitution of the party should be allowed to stand and that impunity must be resisted.
The embattled PDP chieftain said he would appeal having been briefed of the ruling while the substantive case is still pending at the Court of Appeal.
He said: “I respect the position of the court even though I disagree totally with it. The issue is not about Prince Uche Secondus but about the sanctity of our party constitution and core democratic principles of justice and rule of law not only in PDP but in our democracy.
“I have been a witness to how much harm litigations have done to our party in the past and as a result I have been a strong advocate against settling issues in courts.
“This was why I resisted and rejected entreaties of those who wanted me to go to court to halt these forces when it was obvious that they were determined to disrupt my leadership and truncate my tenure in office with the sole objective of hijacking the party for their selfish ulterior motives.
“To allow this travesty to stand is to reduce our beloved party to a level where anybody can wake up over night and remove officers against the proscribed constitutional process and the National Chairman for that matter. And purporting to use the judiciary through an exparte order to legitimize same.
“I wish to, therefore, at this juncture thank and appreciate leaders and other stakeholders of our party who have called in to express their concerns on this matter and appeal for the understanding of all.
“If those who orchestrated and fostered this avoidable crisis had listened to wise counsel of party leaders and elders who advised the withdrawal of cases, this situation would have been avoidable. I wish the party well as always.”
