If not for rotten judiciary, Godswill Akpabio would never be Senator let alone Senate President – Oby Ezekwesili

A former Nigerian Minister of Education, Dr Obiageli Ezekwesili, has said if it was not for the rottenness of the Nigerian Judiciary, particularly the Court of Appeal, Senator Godswill Akpabio would not have been senator, let alone the country's Senate President.

Oby as she is commonly called stated this in a post shared on her X (formerly Twitter) account on Wednesday.

The former Vice President for the World Bank was reacting to discrepancies in the judgement of the Nigeria's Appeal Court in the governorship election cases especially, that of the judgement on the Kano State where the appellate court affirmed the judgment of the Petition Tribunal sacking Governor Abba Kabir Yusuf of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP).

SaharaReporters reported on Tuesday how the Court of Appeal actually set aside the ruling of the Kano Governorship Election Tribunal which sacked Governor Kabir Yusuf and ordered the All Progressives Congress (APC) to pay him N1million, according to the certified copy of the ruling obtained.

According to the court document, the appeal court set aside the ruling of the election tribunal in the petition of the APC, PT/KN/GOV/01/2023 between the APC and the governor.

SaharaReporters had also reported on November 17 that the Court of Appeal in Abuja upheld the ruling of the Election Petitions Tribunal sacking Governor Yusuf of Kano State, apparently contradicting the certified true copy of its judgement that had been issued to parties lawyers.

In another discrepancy, the Court of Appeal sacked the Governor of Plateau State, Caleb Mutfwang of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in pre-election matter and affirmed the election of Governor Hyacinth Alia of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in same pre-election matter.

Reacting to the contradictory Appeal Court judgments in different cases, the former Minister slammed the judges of the Court of Appeal.

She wrote: "Our sharply declining Nigerian Democracy was apparently further assaulted by @Senator_Akpabio who should never have been answering the title of Senator not to talk of “Senate President” were it not for the rottenness of the country’s Judiciary @NGCourtofAppeal that has obviously thrown caution to the wind and allowed itself to be corrupted and captured by decadent politicians.

"Mr Akpabio is regrettably caught up in the web of Hubris. We should remind him and his band of Destroyers of Democracy the wise and legendary words of Marianne Williamson: “Empires always have the hubris to think they are indestructible, when in fact they are always unsustainable.”

"Meanwhile, it was hopeful to see Opposition Party voices finally doing what Democracy demands of them. Kudos to @SenatorNwoye @ireti_kingibe and other Labor Party Senators," the former Minister said.

"Raise your Collective Voice on all matters that affect the Citizens who elected you into office as Lawmakers @nassnigeria. It was what we expected of you on those egregious Luxury SUVs you collected or are waiting to collect.”

"You folks with the People’s Mandate can still lead the way out of the entrapment by this “Monopoly Democracy” of a political class rascality that is now exemplified by Mr Akpabio and his ilk," she maintained.