Governor of Ebonyi State, David Umahi, has mobilized at least 17 Senior Advocates of Nigeria to appeal the decision of the Federal High Court in Abuja, which ousted him from office for defecting from the opposition Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, to the governing All Progressives Congress.
The decision was handed down by Justice Inyang Ekwo on Tuesday.
On Wednesday, the governor said that he has enlisted the help of over 17 top attorneys to help him fight his case.
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He also apologized to the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) and apologized for the purported unflattering comments he made about Justice Ekwo.
While speaking to hundreds of members of the governing APC in his state during a rally at the Udensi roundabout, he apologized.
Umahi stated that he had no remorse over defecting to the APC and pledged to fight the state’s opposition PDP, particularly for attempting to derail his administration.
“I’m still the Governor of Ebonyi State, and I’m still doing my job.” I stated that the PDP attorneys were forum shopping, and I intend to write to the NBA to have them disciplined since the judge was deceived. The judge was not to fault. The PDP attorneys are to fault for misleading the judge.
“And I’m taking use of this occasion to assure Nigerians that no one has chastised the judge, and we will not, since the case was not before a judge.”
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“Today, we have appealed the judgement. We have done three things; we have done the appeal at Enugu, and when I say that, we have two judgements, I say that the judgement in Ebonyi state, which has equal powers with that of Abuja. We said we will obey the judgement in Ebonyi State. We will appeal the judgement of Abuja. We didn’t say we will disobey otherwise we would have not appealed.
“We are before the Appeal of Enugu state and that of Abuja. We have also filed a stay of execution. So, we are still the Governor and Deputy Governor of Ebonyi State,” he stated.
The NMA had asked Umahi to apologise and retract his statement against the person and judgment of Justice Ekwo, whom he described as a “hatchet man”.
Umahi had also described the judgement as “jungle justice”.
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NBA President, Olumide Akpata, in a statement, had reacted, saying Umahi went too far.
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