By Yemi Yusuf
Two top officials of the Labour Party on Wednesday almost came to blows during the sitting of the Presidential Election Petition in Abuja.
The commotion began when the factional national chairman of the Labour Party (LP) Lamidi Apapa, demanded that the Director General of Peter Obi’s presidential campaign council, Akin Osuntokun, vacate his seat for him because as party chairman he was the head of the party and must be seated strategically.
Mr Osuntokun and other party stalwarts had taken their seats in the gallery of the courtroom as soon as court officials opened the courtroom for lawyers and litigants for the day’s proceedings.
However, moments later, Mr Apapa and his colleagues accosted Osuntokun and told him and his group to leave their seats since as the legitimate leader of the party Mr Apapa should be the one sitting there.
Mr Osuntokun refused to relinquish his seat, insisting that Mr Apapa had no right to take the seat and matters would have turned ugly had it not been for the intervention of Josephine Ekperobe, secretary of the Presidential Election Petition Court. She managed to calm down matters down between Messrs Apapa and Osuntokun before the proceedings proper started.
Julius Abure, the suspended national chairman of the Labour Party who is caught in a web of leadership dispute with Mr Apapa, and has earlier been suspended by the party, arrived shortly after matters have been settled between the two leaders.
The Federal Capital Territory (FCT) High Court in Abuja had restrained Mr Abure from parading himself as the national chairman of the party.
The crack within the party had widened since its loss at the presidential election with its factionalisation becoming more pronounced.
In April, the party’s Acting National Publicity Secretary, Obiora Ifoh, called on all election petition tribunals to disregard letters by its suspended National Legal Adviser, Samuel Akingbade, withdrawing all the party’s petitions.
Wednesday’s brouhaha again underlined the fact that all was not well with the leadership of the Labour Party.
