March 23, (THEWILL) – The process of recall launched by constituents of Senator Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan was temporarily halted by a Federal High Court in Lokoja, the Kogi State capital on Thursday. The court granted an interim injunction preventing the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, from receiving or processing any petition aimed at recalling Senator Akpoyi-Uduaghan
The ruling also restrains INEC staff, agents, and associates from acting on petitions allegedly containing fictitious signatures from members of Kogi Central Senatorial District.
The injunction will remain in effect until the court hears the Motion on Notice regarding the matter. According to court documents made public on Friday, March 21, the order was granted following an ex-parte application for an interim injunction.
The application was supported by an Affidavit of Extreme Urgency, sworn to by Anebe Jacob Ogorima and four other registered voters from Kogi Central.
The case was presented by Smart Nwashimere Esq, of West-Idahosa, SAN & Co presented the case before the court.
Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan, has said she is not bothered about the attempts to have her constituents recall her from the Senate.
Also, her party, Peoples Democratic Party accused the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) of sponsoring the recall process, insisting that it will fail.
Meanwhile, Ebira indigenes, a day earlier, had condemned in strong terms, insinuations that the recall process against the lawmaker was not endorsed by the majority of the electorate in the area.
The indigenes, across the five local governments areas that make up Kogi Central Senatorial District, said they had resolved to bring the embattled Senator back home, adding that the embarrassment she had caused the senatorial district had, unfortunately, assumed an “international dimension.”
This stand was taken in a statement jointly signed by the President and Secretary of the Kogi Central Elites Forum (KCEF), Alh. Ibrahim Abdulazeez Ibrahim and Prince Akerejola Johnson of Ogori/Magongo LGA, respectively, on Thursday.
The constituents told Nigerians to disregard the deliberate mischief by the camp of the Kogi Central Senator, suggesting that people were deceived to come out for the recall exercise.
“No one is sponsoring this recall. Our people are largely united on this cause. From the history of Ebiras, you know we cannot be deceived. What she has done has been mainly propaganda. Even some of us that supported her on social media then are no longer with her. We cannot trade the integrity of the state and Nigeria for the selfish, juvenile tendencies of a Senator.”A matter as simple as not taking an assigned seat in the Senate should not be one that would warrant a “sexual harassment” national embarrassment of this nature, especially where all evidences point to blackmail. This is not who we are as Ebiras,” the statement said.
On the issue of INEC disclaiming the exercise, the constituents said the response was misconstrued. “INEC has no official role until after this signature collection phase. We are the ones that are doing the recall, the petitioners. We have to ensure that the required threshold is met before formally presenting it for verification. This is where INEC comes in,” the indigenes noted.
They urged the public to disregard any mischievous interpretation of the recall process, saying politicians would always release statements based on their leanings and selfish interests.
“For us as Ebira people, we are determined to bring Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan back home. While she is at home, she may learn the rudiments of representing her constituents better.
“Ordinarily, we would never have allowed anyone to intimidate our daughter if she was on her right. But in this particular instance, she disrespected the Senate of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, which has clear rules and went on to introduce slants that have never been heard of in the history of the Senate.
“We investigated and we know the truth. Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan should come home and learn the art of law making. It is not about content creation like many people have said,” the Kogi Central constituents said.
Recall that the National Assembly has been hit by allegations of sexual harassment against Senate President Godswill Akpabio after Senator Akpoti-Uduaghan was suspended for six months by the Senate for flouting rules.
Womanifesto, a coalition advocating for gender equity and democracy in Nigeria, has condemned the alleged harassment and intimidation of Kogi Central Senator, Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan.
According to the group, the plans to recall the senator are politically motivated.
The convener of Womanifesto, Abiola Akiyode-Afolabi, expressed concern over reports that constituents were being coerced into supporting the recall effort.
She said, “We are deeply concerned by the harassment, intimidation, and political coercion being meted out against Mrs Akpoti-Uduaghan. Such actions undermine the rule of law and threaten the sanctity of democratic representation.”
According to Womanifesto, the recall effort is part of a broader campaign to discredit the senator following her attendance at the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU) meeting in Geneva.
In her self-defence, Senate Akpoti-Uduaghan said, though she was unofficially nominated to attend the august gathering, she attended the meeting as a private citizen and lawmaker, funding the trip herself without state resources.
However, Section 69 and 110 of the 1999 Constitution and section 116 of the Electoral Act, 2010 empower INEC to conduct recall proceedings against any member of the National Assembly.
Section 69 of the Constitution says a member of the Senate or of the House of Representatives may be recalled as such a member if: “there is presented to the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission a petition in that behalf signed by more than one-half of the persons registered to vote in that member’s constituency alleging their loss of confidence in that member and which signatures are duly verified by the Independent National Electoral Commission; and
(b) the petition is thereafter, in a referendum conducted by the INEC within ninety days of the date of receipt of the petition, approved by a simple majority of the votes of the persons registered to vote in that member’s constituency.”
The Electoral Act in section 2 (c) also empowers INEC to conduct any referendum required under the Constitution.
THEWILL recalls that since the new democratic dispensation started in 1999, no elected official has been successfully recalled. Significantly, the attempt to recall the Senator representing Kogi West Senatorial District, Dino Melaye, failed after the verified signatories to the petition for his recall fell short of requirements. That happened on April 29, 2018.
According to results announced by Professor Ukertor Gabriel Moti, the Declaration Officer for the exercise held in the senatorial district on Saturday, only 18,742 of the 189,870 of the signatories to the petition for the Senator’s recall were verified by INEC.
The verified signatories represented 5.34 percent of the 351,146 registered voters in the Senatorial district. For the verification exercise to succeed, 50 percent plus one of the signatories to the petition had to be verified.
Explaining the near impossibility of recalling an elected member under the current democratic dispensation, the Policy and Legal Advocacy Centre, PLAC, said the “Nigerian voter registration process is fraught with inaccuracies and incomplete data, which further complicates the signature collection process. Many registered voters may have relocated, lost their voting cards, or may simply be unavailable to participate in a recall process.”
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