The Port Harcourt Division of the Court of Appeal has affirmed a Rivers State High Court order nullifying the ward, local government and state congresses of the All Progressives Congress in the state.
PrimeTimes Nigeria reports that the congresses had produced the Tony Okocha-led executive loyal to the Minister of the Federal Capital Territory, Nyesom Wike.
The appellate court dismissed the appeal filed by the Okocha-led executive, holding that it was incompetent.
Justice Godswill Obomanu of the Rivers State High Court had, on December 20, 2024, issued an ex parte order restraining the APC from conducting congresses in the state.
Despite the order, the party proceeded with the congresses, which led to the emergence of Okocha as chairman alongside other executives.
The congresses were later nullified by the high court after the Emeka Beke-led faction returned to court.
Dissatisfied with the decision, Okocha filed an appeal marked CA/PH/523/2026.
He argued that the high court lacked jurisdiction to entertain the matter and therefore had no power to issue the restraining order.
However, in a decision delivered by Justice Elfreida Williams-Dawodu, JCA, the Court of Appeal affirmed the jurisdiction of the high court and struck out the appeal for want of competence.
Confirming the judgment, counsel to the Emeka Beke-led APC, Emenike Ebete, said the appeal was filed against the order nullifying the congresses.
Ebete said, “An appeal was filed by Tony Okocha exco against the order of Justice Obomanu that nullified the congresses that were conducted by APC while the matter was in court.
“Now, before those congresses were conducted, the court gave an ex parte order restraining them from conducting those congresses. They disobeyed the order of the court, went ahead and conducted local government, state, and ward congresses.
“So we went back to the high court and prayed that those congresses be nullified, having disobeyed the court order, and the court nullified the congresses.”
Ebete said the Okocha-led faction had asked the Court of Appeal to strike out the suit for lack of jurisdiction.
He said, “They appealed to the court of appeal against the ex parte order, and in that appeal they were saying that the court has no jurisdiction to make any order at all and that the court should strike out the suit for want of jurisdiction.
“If that had happened, then the order nullifying the congresses would’ve all gone.
“That appeal was dismissed because the court said the appeal was incompetent. We’ve not gotten the full text of the judgment, but the good news is that the court said their appeal was incompetent and struck it out, meaning that the order the high court made nullifying their congresses still stands.”
Ebete clarified that the appeal was different from the judgment of Justice Sika Aprioku, which sacked Okocha and his executive as leaders of the APC in Rivers State.
The Okocha-led faction, however, disagreed with the Court of Appeal’s decision.
In a statement signed by the party’s publicity secretary, Chibike Ikenga, the faction said it had applied for a certified true copy of the judgment.
“We have applied for the judgment of the Court of Appeal delivered today. Once the copy of the judgement is made available, our lawyers will address us on the next line of action,” the statement read.