Umahi Apologises To NBA Over Comment On Judiciary

Ebonyi State Governor, Chief David Umahi, on Wednesday, tendered an unreserved apology to the Nigeria Bar Association (NBA) over his diatribe against Justice Iyang Ekwo of the Federal High Court Abuja.

Umahi, while reacting to the Tuesday ruling of the Federal High Court Abuja which sacked him and his Deputy from office for defecting from PDP to APC, accused Justice Ekwo of bias and corruption, and vowed not to obey the judgement.

But speaking on Wednesday while addressing his supporters in Abakaliki, Umahi said the comments he made against Ekwo and the judiciary were targeted at the PDP lawyers whom he accused of misleading the Judge to give the judgement.

He stated that he has absolute confidence in the Nigerian judiciary and beg his supporters to stop making disparaging remarks against the judge and the judiciary.

He announced that he has appealed the ruling and will continue to serve as the Governor of the state while waiting for the ruling of the appellate court.

He said “I don’t want you to go against the law. What people thought is for evil, it has promoted your Governor to the next level. I want to thank Nigerians, I want to thank Ebonyi people. I am just here to two things to you; one is to tell you to be very peaceful, number two is to tell you that we still have very serious confidence in the judiciary.

“The Chairman published something and I spoke to the press and I said the Judge is biased but when we spoke this afternoon, we understood ourselves and I said that the lawyers of PDP, they were the people that did the hatchet job and I said that the lawyers of the PDP were the people that were doing forum shopping and I am going to write the NBA to discipline them because you know, the Judge was misled. 

"In Bayelsa governorship election, APC won the election but because there was something defective in the credentials of the Deputy governorship candidate, the Supreme court in their wisdom saw that the votes cast in any election, belongs to the candidates and not the party but lawyers knew about this but they misled the Judge.

“The case of Amaechi that they quoted, the Supreme Court has said do not cite the case again. So, the blame is to the PDP lawyers and I am using the opportunity to let Nigerians know that nobody castigated the judge and we will not. We even made comments yesterday because the matter was not before any judge. 

"Today, we have Appealed; we have done three things. We have done the Appeal at Enugu and when I said that we have two judgments; I said that the judgment in Ebonyi state which has equal powers with that Abuja, I said we will obey the judgment in Ebonyi state, we will Appeal the judgment of Abuja high court, we did not say we will disobey otherwise we will not Appeal. So, are before the Appeal in Enugu and we are before the Appeal in Abuja and we have also filed a stay of execution over there. So, we are still the Governor and Deputy Governor of your state

“Do not comment against the judiciary at all, the same thing goes with the House of Assembly. Yesterday, I made it very clear that the Supreme Court has said that for any defection in any of the legislative houses, the presiding officer who is the Speaker or the Senate President has the duty and not the court to declare the seat vacant.

“We have Appealed against that and our house of Assembly are still intact. So, there is nothing to entertain any fear, go about your business very peacefully and let us assure the NBA Chairman that he is a perfect gentleman and that we will never insult the judiciary, we have confidence in the judiciary and I know they will do the right thing and we have engaged 8 SAN to proceed to Abuja, we have engaged 10 SAN to produce to Enugu. Do not be angry about anything, it is for our promotion. What the people intended for evil, God has turned it for good. When it happened yesterday, God told me to be still and know that I am God. And so, you will see what God is going to do, Nigerians are fighting for us.”