Senate Tussle: Akpabio Gets Appeal Court Leave To Stop Removal Of Name

Former governor of Akwa Ibom State, Senator Godswill Akpabio, has been granted leave to challenge the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) over plans to delete his name as the authentic candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the race for Ikot Ekpene

Senatorial District (Akwa Ibom North-West) seat in the 2023 poll, it was learnt yesterday.

The chief press secretary (CPS) to the former minister of Niger Delta Affairs, Jackson Udom told journalists in Uyo, the state capital yesterday that the Court of Appeal, Abuja, "granted the leave to Senator Godswill Akpabio as an interested party to appeal the judgement of the court, which ordered the INEC, to delete his name and declared former deputy inspector-general of police (DIG), Udom Ekpoudom, in his stead.

The court on Monday, November 14, 2022, in the appeal brought by Ekpoudom against the APC and INEC, held that Ekpoudom was the candidate of the APC for Ikot Ekpene senatorial district in the 2023 elections.

Akpabio's counsel Umeh Kalu and Berth Igwilo had applied for leave for Akpabio to be joined in the appeal "because he was not a party in the proceedings, to enable him approach the Supreme Court for reprieve."

A group, 'We The People' (WTP) has vowed to sue international oil companies operating in the Niger Delta region for the destruction of the environment and livelihood of the people for the past 64 years of oil exploration and exploitation in the re region.

WTP executive director, Ken Henshaw disclosed this yesterday in Port Harcourt, the Rivers State capital, while speaking during a one-day multi-stakeholders conference on oil company divestments in the Niger Delta.

Henshaw said, "I think what the oil companies have done to the Niger Delta, the environmental pollution they have caused, the livelihood loss they have caused, the destruction of the environment they have engendered, the wellknown and well documented health risks that they oil companies have created, are enough grounds to take them to Court.

"We think the oil companies can be found wanting and accounting on the basis of the fact that they have for 64 years of extraction, destroyed the traditional livelihood of the people."