The Abuja Division of the Federal High Court, on Monday, dismissed a suit instituted by Fubara Dagogo, a member of the All Progressives Congress, seeking to void the party’s recently conducted national congress.
Justice Joyce Abdulmalik, in a judgment, held that the court lacked jurisdiction to entertain the case, which concerned the internal affairs of a political party.
Ms Abdulmalik held that issues surrounding candidates’ nomination and purchase of nomination forms, including the expression of interest form, are non-justiciable.
The judge, who struck out the suit, awarded a N10 million fine each against Mr Dagogo and his lawyer, totalling N20 million, in favour of all four defendants.
Mr Dagogo, an aspirant in the recently concluded APC national congress, had filed the suit to challenge his alleged exclusion from the party’s national convention election.
The plaintiff, through his lawyer, Ogochukwu Onyema, named the APC and Nentawe Yilwatda, the party’s national chairman, as the first and second defendants, respectively.
Mr Dagogo also listed Victor Giadom, the party’s national vice-chairman, South South, and Sulaiman Muitamma, APC’s national organising secretary, as the 3rd and 4th defendants, respectively.
In the originating summons, marked FHC/ABJ/CS/591/2026, dated March 22 and filed March 23 by his lawyer, Mr Dagogo, sought six reliefs.
The aggrieved aspirant asked the court to nullify the outcome of any party’s national congress for the position of national vice-chairman, South-South, without his physical participation.
He urged the judge to determine whether there could be a legitimate zonal congress for the South-South APC, given his alleged unlawful exclusion after he was duly cleared and paid for his expression of interest and nomination forms.
He urged the court to declare that by virtue of the APC’s payment acknowledgement receipt no. 26827 dated March 13, and issued to him, he is entitled to receive the requisite EoI and nomination forms as an aspirant for the position of national vice chairman, South-South Nigeria.
He asked the court to award general damages of N100 million against the third and fourth defendants for the discomfitures, embarrassments and mental torture they occasioned to him with their ill conduct.
But the APC, in its earlier preliminary objection filed by the former lawyer, Kayode Okunade, urged the court to strike out or dismiss the suit for want of jurisdiction.
Mr Okunade also asked the court for an order striking out the originating summons filed by Mr Dagogo as incompetent.
The lawyer, in his eighth ground of argument, said the subject matter of the suit bordered on the internal affairs of a political party, which were non-justiciable and outside the court’s jurisdiction.
He said Mr Dagogo’s complaint, relating to non-issuance of a nomination form despite payment, concerned the conduct of the party’s congresses and pre-primary processes, which were within the exclusive domestic jurisdiction of the party.
Mr Okunade argued that the applicant lacked the locus standi to institute the action, having not been duly recognised as a valid aspirant under the APC Constitution and Guidelines.
He said the suit was premature, the applicant having failed to exhaust the internal dispute resolution mechanisms provided under the party’s constitution.
The lawyer, who said the suit constituted an abuse of court process and was intended to invite the court to interfere in the discretionary powers of a political party, argued that Mr Dagogo had not disclosed any reasonable cause of action against the respondents.
(NAN)
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