Defection: Supreme Court orders Ondo Rep to vacate seat

The Supreme Court on Friday ordered a member of House of Representatives representing Akure South/North Federal Constituency of Ondo State, Ifedayo Abegunde, to vacate his seat on account of his defection from the Labour Party, which sponsored his election.Abegunde defected from the LP to the now defunct Action Congress of Nigeria in 2011.

In a unanimous decision by the seven-man panel led by the Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Mahmud Mohammed, the apex court held that a legislator’s defection to another party could only be justified if there was a division in the national structures which incapacitated the party that sponsored his election, to function.

The apex court held that Abegunde’s defection could not be justified since his excuse of purported division in the Labour Party was not in existence at the national level of the party.

The court noted that the “division” or “factionalisation” of Labour Party cited by Abegunde as his excuse for abandoning the party was only at the state level.

The judgement affirmed the concurrent decisions of the Akure divisions of the Federal High Court and Court of Appeal, both of which had earlier ruled that Abegunde’s defection was unjustifiable.

Justice Musa Muhammad, who read the lead judgement of the Supreme Court on Friday, held that only a “division that made it “impossible or impracticable” for the party to function by virtue of the proviso in section 68(1)(g) of the constitution “justifies” a person’s defection to another party.

In the opening of his judgement, Justice Muhammad, said he had earlier on March 19, 2015 dismissed Abegunde’s appeal and the cross-appeal filed with respect to the case as both were “unmeritorious.” He explained that the Friday’s judgement was to give the reasons for dismissing the appeal and the cross appeal.

Justice Muhammad explained that by virtue of the combined provisions of section 68(1)(a) and (g) as well as section 222(a), (e) and (f) of the constitution, division in a party at the state level did not entitle a legislator to abandon the party on whose platform he or she contested and won his or her seat.

The apex court rejected the argument canvassed by the counsel for the appellant, Mr. Akin Ladipo, to the effect that not “any division” in a political party would entitle a person to defect from a party who sponsored his election without having to lose his seat.

Abegunde had defected from LP to the ACN in 2011 and in a bid to pre-empt the party from recalling him; he filed a suit at the Federal High Court in Akure.

In its judgement delivered on May 30, 2012, the Federal High Court dismissed Abegunde’s suit and the counter-claim filed by some of the defendants in the suit.

Dissatisfied with the judgement, Abegunde further appealed to the Court of Appeal, which in its decision delivered on September 15, 2015, also dismissed the appellant’s case.

Abegunde further appealed to the Supreme Court and on March 19, 2015, the apex court dismissed the appeal and the respondents’ cross-appeals. The apex court only explained the reasoning behind its earlier March 19 decision.