The names of Labour Party’s Julius Abure and the Peoples Democratic Party’s Senator Samuel Anyanwu have resurfaced on the website of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, as national chairman and national secretary respectively.
The election umpire also re-listed Alhaji Umar Farouk Ibrahim as National Secretary of the Labour Party.
While INEC stated that the reinstatement of Abure and Farouk was based on an order of court, it however did not indicate if Anyanwu’s also as a result of court order.
The Supreme Court had last month set aside earlier decisions of the Federal High Court and the Court of Appeal which recognised Mr. Abure as Labour Party’s National Chairman.
Since then, Abure has continued to lay claim to the seat, relying on the apex court’s decision that the issue of his chairmanship remained an internal affair of the Labour Party and was therefore not justiceable.
However, Abia State Governor, Alex Otti and the 2023 presidential candidate of the party, Mr. Peter Obi had insisted on the validity of a Caretaker Committee, chaired by Senator Nenadi Usman, saying the ruling effectively sacked Abure.