APC crisis: Buhari’s legal advisers mischievous, says Prof. Sagay

Chairman of Presidential Advisory Committee against Corruption, PACAC, Prof. Itse Sagay, has described the legal advisers who advised President Muhammadu Buhari to recognize Victor Giadom as the acting National Chairman of the All Progressives Congress because of an ‘outdated’ court order as being mischievous.

Professor Sagay in an interview said the legal advice the president got is mischievous in the extreme because there was no court order to extend since it does not exist.

The professor of law said Victor Giadom, the convener has no right to summon the virtual National Executive Council Meeting of the All Progressives Congress because a deputy national secretary is not in line to succeed the national chairman. He said the ex-parte order Giadom is relying on to claim acting chairmanship had since lapsed.

“I’m stunned by this turn of events. How can a deputy national secretary have the ambition to be the chairman of a party when you have deputy chairmen and vice-chairmen? That is why it is absurd. It does not make sense. His position makes it impossible for him to be the acting national chairman.

“Second, he is relying on an ex-parte order in which he alone was present and the court gave him an interim order in March. These orders last for 14 days. He turns up in June to say it has been extended – something that is dead, that does not exist and has lapsed. That is the second absurdity. If he had applied for a fresh order, that would have been different.

“When I heard of the developments, I was stunned into silence. I’m as stunned as to how such a person could be given legitimacy at the highest level.

“The legal advice the President got is mischievous in the extreme because there is no court order to extend since it does not exist. It died two weeks after it was made. The line of succession of the chairman cannot come from the Secretary. So the whole thing is an absurdity. I always hear of the theatre of the absurd, but this is one of the worst I’ve ever heard of.”