An Abuja High Court on Friday told the factional National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, Alhaji Abubakar Kawu Baraje, to stop parading himself as such.
Rather, the court, presided over by Justice Adefope Okojie, said the faction led by Alhaji Bamanga Tukur is the authentic National Working Committee of the PDP.
Tukur and members of his NWC had gone to court to contest the existence of the Baraje faction, popularly known as the nPDP.
The members of the nPDP, which has in its fold seven governors elected on the platform of the PDP and former Vice President Atiku Abubakar, was formed as a result of dissatisfaction with the process of the Special National Convention that produced the NEC members of the Tukur faction.
Update
Justice Evoh Chukwu of the Federal High Court sitting in Abuja on Friday ordered Alhaji Kawu Baraje, Olagunsoye Oyinlola, and Sam Jaja to stop parading themselves as national officers of the PDP.
Chukwu said this in his judgment in a suit brought to it on September 6 by the National Chairman of the PDP, Alhaji Bamanga Tukur and 12 others.
The judge further restrained the Baraje-led new PDP from interfering with the duties of the “Bamanga Tukur-led leadership of the party”.
Chukwu also restrained the respondents from operating secretariats of the “New PDP” at the national, state or local levels.
He said: “I further order the Independent National Electoral Commission not to cancel the result of the Special Convention of the party organised on Aug.31 at the Eagles Square in Abuja.
“I will not make any order as to cost.”
Earlier, Chukwu dismissed all the respondents’ preliminary objections raised against the jurisdiction of the court to entertain the suit.
The court also dismissed the objections alleging that the plaintiffs abused court process by instituting the suit.
According to the respondents, the court should have directed parties to plead their evidence by appearing physically in court to testify in view of the contentious nature of the suit.
The PDP has been embroiled in crisis since August 31 when a faction walked out from the venue of an ongoing national convention of the party and appointed a new executive committee.