The Enugu chapter of the All Progressives Congress (APC) has pledged to take decisive action to secure the release of Bright Ngene, the Labour Party candidate in the last general election for the Enugu South Urban State Constituency.
Ngene’s election was annulled by the Appeal Court, which ordered a rerun. However, three previous attempts to hold the rerun have failed.
In a sudden turn of events, Ngene was sentenced to a 7-year jail term by a magistrate court in Enugu over his alleged involvement in a community matter.
Addressing journalists outside the Enugu Correctional Service on Saturday, Barrister Ugochukwu Agballah, the APC chairman in Enugu State, declared the judgment unacceptable.
He expressed dismay that Ngene, whom he described as the presumed winner of the election, was imprisoned while trying to recover his mandate.
Agballah said he was instructed by the Minister of Innovation, Science and Technology, Uche Nnaji, to investigate the situation after meeting with Ngene.
He alleged that there was a plot by a Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) cabal to prevent the Labour Party candidate from realizing his mandate.
“We are going to do everything to make sure that justice is done in the matter and whoever, no matter how highly placed, that has a hand in this miscarriage of justice will be brought to justice because nobody is above the law, including judicial officers,” Agballah vowed.
He also hinted that the issue would be escalated to the zonal leadership of the APC and President Bola Tinubu.
Furthermore, Agballah disclosed plans to appeal the judgment and emphasized that they would not accept a rerun of the election without the jailed Labour Party candidate.
The leadership of the Labour Party in Enugu has also condemned the jail term handed to Ngene.
The party wrote to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), requesting the suspension of the planned rerun election in Ngene’s constituency to prevent giving the ruling PDP an undue advantage as a result of the judgment.
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