By Elder Abraham Amah
The recent decision by the Independent National Electoral Commission to recognize the Mohammed and Anyanwu led Caretaker National Working Committee of the Peoples Democratic Party is more than a routine administrative action. It is a profound reaffirmation of a foundational democratic principle, the supremacy of the rule of law. By aligning its conduct with the clear pronouncements of the Federal High Court, Ibadan Division, INEC restored institutional order after a needless period of political brinkmanship.
This episode has also exposed, in stark relief, how a small circle of former party leaders chose a game of shame over constitutional fidelity. The reckless gambit undertaken under the watch of former PDP Chairman Umar Damagum and former Board of Trustees Chairman Adolphus Wabara culminated in the ill advised decision to draft a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Taminu Turaki, into a project designed to cloak illegality in legal sophistry. The law does not yield to eloquence. It bows only to legitimacy.
At the core of the crisis was a deliberate disobedience to subsisting court orders. Two Federal High Court judgments restrained both the conduct and the consequences of the so called Ibadan convention. Yet, rather than submit to judicial authority, the architects of this misadventure pressed ahead, parading beneficiaries of an annulled process and daring institutions to look the other way. That gamble nearly rocked the PDP boat, weakened public confidence, and squandered valuable time that should have been devoted to reconciliation and rebuilding.
When defiance inevitably met consequence, the response was not humility but escalation. The same actors returned to court seeking an order of mandamus to compel INEC to recognize an arrangement already voided by the judiciary. The outcome was decisive and unsurprising. They lost. The Ibadan court refused to reward contempt with validation or permit a backdoor resurrection of a process it had already nullified. This was not judicial inflexibility. It was the law asserting its own integrity.
The lesson could not be clearer. The rule of law means the supremacy of the law over persons, passions, and power. Court orders are not suggestions, and judgments are not invitations to negotiate. Those who willfully violate them forfeit the protection of the courts. Equity aids the vigilant, not the defiant. No amount of legal maneuvering can sanitize an act done in contempt.
INEC deserves commendation for resisting pressure and standing firmly with legality. By engaging exclusively with the Mohammed and Anyanwu led Caretaker National Working Committee, the Commission affirmed that institutions must be guided by judicial certainty, not political noise. In doing so, it foreclosed parallel claims, restored clarity, and created the space needed for the party to heal.
For the PDP, the path forward is unmistakable. This moment must mark a return to discipline, humility, and constitutional obedience. The party’s resilience has always rested on structure and process, not shortcuts or bravado. Those who nearly capsized the ship through their disregard for court orders should reflect soberly on the damage done and on the providence that the party survived the ordeal.
In the end, the courts spoke plainly and INEC listened. That is how democracies endure. The PDP must now internalize the lesson that when the law speaks, politics must listen. Only then can unity be rebuilt, trust restored, and the party credibly repositioned for the future.
Elder Amah, a philosopher and public affairs analyst, contributed this piece from Abuja.
