The court of Appeal sitting in Ilorin has affirmed Bashir Bolarinwa as the authentic Chairman of the All Progressives Congress in Kwara State, upholding the position of the APC National Working Committee. The Appeal Court in a judgement delivered on Tuesday and read by Justice Ibrahim Saulawa upheld the expulsion of Ishola Balogun-Fulani and his executive members from the party by the National Working Committee of the party. Having last week ruled in an interlocutory appeal that the court lacked jurisdiction to hear Balogun-Fulani’s case, the appeal court allowed the APC’s main appeal but dismissed the ‘sister appeal’ by Bolarinwa because it amounted to a “mere academic exercise”. However, the appeal court struck out all the orders earlier granted by the lower court because the court lacked the jurisdiction to issue such reliefs. The appeal court held that the State High Court lacked jurisdiction to hear the matter because various conditions precedent were not met, saying the court had acted in error to hear it at all.

Source: Punch February 19, 2019 12:47 UTC