Tony Okafor,Awka
Oil mogul, Prince Arthur Eze, has told a High Court of the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, that Senator Andy Uba was never a governor of Anambra State as he( Uba) is wont to claim .
Recall that Uba was sworn in as the governor of the state in 2007 but sacked after 17 days in office following a petition by Mr Peter Obi who averred that he had four year to serve as governor of the state having been sworn in on March, 17, 2006.
Obi vied for the governorship of the state in 2003 but the Independent National Electoral Commission declared Dr Chris Ngige the winner of the poll which was severally upturned by the courts in favour of Obi which resulted in Obi’s swearing in in 2006 as authentic winner of 2003 poll.
In 2007, INEC conducted a governorship poll in the state with the presumption that Obi was only serving out the remaining tenure of Ngige who was sworn in 2003. But the Supreme Court in its judgement on the matter disagreed with INEC, stating that INEC ought not to have conducted the poll that brought in because the tenure of a state governor should commence reading from the day he was sworn in, which in this case ,was on March 2006 when Obi was sworn.
But in an affidavit deposed at the Abuja court , circulated to journalists on Sunday, Prince Arthur Eze told the court that Senator Andy Uba merely usurped the office of the governor of the state for 17 days and was unseated by a judgement of the Supreme Court wherein the court declared that he was never a governor of the state but an impostor .
These averments were contained in a 32 paragraph affidavits sworn to and filed in the court registry by a litigation secretary, Mr. Stephen Okpoh in the law firm of Ike Ike and associates with the authority of Prince (Engr.) Arthur Eze, Chairman of Oranto Petroleum Ltd, who is the judgement creditor in a suit of non payment of a N50m loan instituted against Uba by his( Arthur Eze’s) company.
The court was further told that Senator Uba who is a judgement debtor in the case was not a law abiding citizen as he had arranged and benefitted from a sham governorship primary election of his political party.
The primary election, according to the affidavit, was that of the All Progressives Congress (APC ) conducted ahead of the 2021 governorship election in Anambra state which the three-tiers of courts in Nigeria invalidated.
Eze said contrary to Uba’s claim, he was not a brother or friend of the judgement creditor Oranto Petroleum Ltd- a limited liability company that does not share human consanguineous relationship.
The court was also told that Senator Uba, the judgement debtor, had in the past exploited his closeness to Prince Arthur Eze by deploying under-hand tactics to fleece him of humongous sums of money.
Eze further cited in the sworn and registered affidavits in court, a case where Senator Uba sent his personal assistant, one Emmanuel Major Okwuosa who fleeced Prince Arthur Eze of one million US Dollars which Prince Eze eventually recovered through a court judgement which was executed.
It would be recalled that a state High Court sitting in Ekwulobia, Anambra State had earlier entered judgement in favour of Oranto Petroleum Limited in the case it instituted against Senator Uba over his refusal to pay back a N50m interest-free loan granted to him by Oranto Petroleum Ltd owned by billionaire philanthropist Prince (Engr) Arthur Eze which led to the seizure of some of Uba’s property by men of the Federal Capital Territory High Court enforcement unit Abuja as a result of an order of the court authorizing the execution of the Anambra State High Court judgement in Abuja.
Uba had however filed a motion pleading for a court order to be paying back the loan by instalments of N1m monthly which the judgement creditor had rejected in his counter affidavits describing it as a ploy by the judgement debtor not to pay back the loan.
Oranto Petroleum had claimed further in the counter affidavits opposing the N1m monthly instalmental payment that the judgement debtor, Andy Uba, had not disclosed to the court his incomes and assets in his motion papers filed in court as required by law.
The company maintained that Uba had deliberately concealed and hid from the court his humongous income and assets from oil blocs, private jets,stocks in blue chip companies in Nigeria and the United States of America.
The company further pleaded with the court that it would be in the interest of justice that the application filed by Senator Andy Uba be refused.
