A director in Senator David Mark’s campaign organisation, Dr Adakole Elijah has said that the Idoma people who are a minority but highly enlightened would support a strong character to represent their cause in the senate instead of a lackey who carries handbags for other senators.
Dr Elijah’s statement was triggered by claims by the All Progressives Congress, APC candidate in the Benue South Senatorial District rerun election, Daniel Onjeh that the Idoma people are no longer in support of Sen Mark’s ambition to represent them at the senate.
It would be recalled that the Court of Appeal sitting in Makurdi last Saturday annulled Sen Mark’s election and ordered a rerun within ninety days. Mark who Is the immediate past Senate President is a member of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP.
However, Dr Elijah while briefing newsmen in Makurdi, on Wednesday, said he will not join issues with Onjeh to dignify him even as he stressed that the Idomas whom he said are not fools would continue to maintain their support for Sen Mark in order to protect their integrity and destiny.
“We will not toy with our destiny and that of our children to a man who is an agent of externalities to represent us,” Elijah stated.
He described the judgment of the Appellate court as shallow and lacking logic, particularly that the court relied on the clerical error of the returning officer who signed the result on 28 instead of 29 March, 2015, arguing “what the court needed to have done was to set aside the declaration and collate since the date does not invalidate election if there was a clerical error, in so far as it does not change the result.”
He bolstered his argument with the judgment delivered by the president of the Court of Appeal, Justice Zainab Bulkachua which he said the Court of Appeal in Makurdi misapplied in the instant case. “Bulkachwua said election is like a pyramid, it grows from down to the top, you cannot stay at the top and quash any election that has properly taken place from the bottom, that election that has not been challenged at the polling unit, ward and local government cannot be nullified.”
Dr Elijah also wondered why the Court of Appeal relied heavily on the senatorial election result Onjeh dumped on document which was rejected by the lower court in July and was not appeal against. He said for the Appeal Court to resurrect such a document and base its judgment on it is curious and said they have to explain to the world if they had no vested interest.
“We are not afraid of anything, we want to point to Nigerians the lacunae, the world thing is curious for resurrecting a document whose ruling was not appealed against. We want the judgment to be published for the whole world to see.”
He described the denial by the state government through the senior special adviser to the governor on Media and ICT, Terver Akase that it did not interfere in the judgment of the court as a case of the owl crying in the night and the child dying in the morning.
“Why did the state government deny having hand in the judgment when it was not accused, we want to get the judgment and expose them,” Elijah further stated.
He wondered why Onjeh whom he said drew school fees from the purse of Sen Mark when he was a university student would turn round to lie to Nigerians that Mark did not do anything for his people, adding that Mark, apart from assisting Onjeh had given scholarship to over 12,000 students across the state, with each benefitting over twenty thousand naira.
He also listed among others, human capital development, employment and appointment of Idoma people into the critical sectors of the Nigerian economy, construction of a N17billion hydro dam at Otobi Akpa in Otukpo local government, the multi billion naira Otukpo-Oweto road and Loco bridge, influencing of Federal University of Health Sciences to Idoma land, though it has been revered by the APC government, construction of class rooms, boreholes and rural roads across Idoma land as imprints of Sen Mark’s positive impartation on his constituents.
