The leadership crisis rocking the African Democratic Congress took a fresh turn on Friday after the Federal High Court in Abuja adjourned indefinitely a suit filed by factional leader, Nafiu Bala Gombe, following a request seeking the reassignment of the case to another judge.
Justice Emeka Nwite adjourned the matter sine die after parties exchanged arguments over a letter reportedly written by the plaintiff to the Chief Judge of the Federal High Court requesting the transfer of the suit marked FHC/ABJ/CS/1819/2025.
The suit had earlier been stalled after an interlocutory appeal filed by former Senate President David Mark, listed as the second defendant, progressed to the Supreme Court.
At Friday’s proceedings, counsel to the plaintiff, Luka Musa Haruna, informed the court that the apex court had on April 30, 2026, dismissed the interlocutory appeal for lacking merit and vacated the Court of Appeal’s order staying proceedings in the substantive suit.
Haruna, however, disclosed that the plaintiff had submitted a letter dated May 4, 2026, to the Chief Judge of the Federal High Court, requesting that the matter be reassigned to another judge.
According to him, the application had already been forwarded to the court registrar, urging Justice Nwite to await the administrative decision of the Chief Judge.
The request sparked strong objections from defence counsel, who accused the plaintiff of attempting to frustrate the accelerated hearing earlier ordered by the Court of Appeal and upheld by the Supreme Court.
Counsel for the first defendant, Realwan Okpanachi, who represented S.E. Aruwa, argued that the plaintiff misrepresented the Supreme Court judgment, insisting that the apex court partially allowed the appeal and sustained the directive for accelerated hearing.
He further accused the plaintiff of ambushing the defendants with the transfer request.
“We consider the move an attempt to frustrate the order for accelerated hearing granted by the Court of Appeal and affirmed by the Supreme Court,” he argued.
Counsel for the second defendant, Sulaiman Usman, also criticised the move, describing it as “forum shopping and judge shopping.”
Usman maintained that the Supreme Court had commended Justice Nwite over his handling of the matter and warned against allowing what he termed a dangerous judicial trend.
Other defence lawyers aligned with the submissions, arguing that substantive applications could not be validly introduced through ordinary correspondence.
Responding, Haruna insisted that the plaintiff stood by the request and faulted the defence team for attacking a letter they had not seen.
In his ruling, Justice Nwite held that the court could not take any decision on the letter without hearing all parties involved.
He stated that since the correspondence was addressed to the Chief Judge, the trial court was not in a position to make pronouncements on it.
The judge subsequently adjourned the matter indefinitely to allow parties file the Certified True Copy of the Supreme Court judgment, serve the defendants with the transfer request and await further directives from the Chief Judge of the Federal High Court.
