A former governor of Plateau State, Jonah Jang, has described the recent Appeal Court judgements which removed some lawmakers elected on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) from the National and State Assemblies, as a miscarriage of justice of a great proportion.
Jang, who once represented Plateau North in the Senate, said the judgements by the Appellate Court have robbed the people of their rightful representatives.
LEADERSHIP reports that some PDP National and State Assembly members from Plateau State were recently sacked from their legislative seats by the courts over disobedience to court order by their party to conduct lawful congresses in the State.
However, the state governor, Caleb Mutfwang, also elected on the platform of the PDP in the 2023 general election, survived when the Supreme Court on Friday affirmed his election.
Jang, in a statement issued in Jos by his media consultant, Comrade Clinton Garuba, while reacting to the legal victory of Governor Mutfwang at the Supreme Court, said the government of Plateau State and the PDP had already petitioned the National Judicial Council (NJC) to review all the judgements involving the state that were delivered by the Court of Appeal which effectively stopped those that have been elected to the National and the State Assemblies from representing their constituencies.
Referring to those pronounced winners by the Appeal Court, Jang said: “It has become an abnormality for them to remain as legislators when they could not win elections at the poll, this should not be allowed to stand.”
According to the former governor, the authorities must give back to the people their true representatives and restore their mandate, adding that they will continue to support the government of Governor Caleb Mutfwang, who in his only eight months of stay in office, has done what the previous administration under former Governor Simon Lalong could not accomplish in eight years.
Jang called on the good people of Plateau State to stand very united as they are going to come out strong at the end of the day, stressing that the governor’s victory at the Supreme Court was a victory for democracy and against the wishes of anti-democratic forces, recalling with sadness how anti-democratic forces tried as much as possible to manipulate the will of the people without success
“We must thank the justices for upholding the Rule of Law thereby affirming the long-held belief that the judiciary is the last hope of the common man. We thank them for not allowing themselves to be manipulated because we are aware that the same forces of darkness, in their usual manner, had wanted to thwart the mandate of the people, plunge the state into disarray and set us years backwards.”
