PRESS RELEASE
The judgment of a Federal High Court declaring Rochas Okorocha winner of the APC primaries is a complete travesty of justice, and the Court of Appeal will be approached to reverse it.Access Services
The judgment by the Federal High Court in Abuja, which ordered that Okorocha be published as the winner of the APC primaries for Imo West Senatorial District, is in defiance of extant judicial pronouncements of the Apex Court of the Land, Hon. Declan Emelumba, Imo State Commissioner for Information ,Public Orientation and Strategy has declared.Access Services
In a statement in Owerri, he said the trial judge, Justice Obiora Egwuatu, defied all known rules of law in delivering the judgment, noting that Justice Egwuatu was presented with Supreme Court judgments which held that matters pertaining to forgery and perjury cannot be entertained through the originating summons procedure, but for unfathomable reasons, he chose to defy the authority of the Supreme Court to deliver judgment in favour of Okorocha based on affidavit evidence founded on forged documents.Buy Maps
Despite being availed of a subsisting Supreme Court ruling in Orji v. Chima, which requires any litigant seeking to be declared winner of a primary election to file their case within 14 days of the primaries, the judge, he said, went ahead to overrule the preliminary objection even though he found that the sole issue for determination was who was the winner of the primary election conducted on May 18, 2026. This was in spite of the fact that Okorocha filed his case on August 13, 2026, while the primaries were held on May 18, 2026, a clear 87 days after.
As law-abiding citizens, we would explore the judicial avenues available to set aside the Federal High Court ruling and recover our mandate.
Earlier this month, the police arrested Okorocha and charged him to court for parading fake results of the APC primaries for Imo West Senatorial District.
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had also disowned the fake document tendered by Okorocha, saying that the genuine winner of the APC primaries, as submitted to INEC by the APC, is Governor Hope Uzodimma.
