By Tunde Olusunle
There are moments when a court judgement does not merely decide a case, but exposes the moral rot at the centre of our public life. The judgement of the Federal High Court, Abuja, on Wednesday, November 4, 2026, in Suit No. FHC/LKJ/CS/63/2026, nullifying the APC senatorial primary for Kogi West duly won by Senator Sunday Steve Karimi and awarding the ticket to Samuel Bamidele Aro, is one such moment. It is not law. It is not justice. It is a farce dressed in the robe of law. How do you nullify a primary duly conducted and won, and hand its fruit to a man who, on record, exited the race in writing before it was held? As Pastor Stanley Ajileye wrote from Lokoja, one is tempted to announce, with sadness and irony, that the Rule of Law has lost its rule.
Let us be clear about the facts. Aro was a Member of the House of Representatives between 2007 and 2011. Earlier this year he sought the APC ticket for Kogi West. But just before the primary on Monday, May 18, 2026, Aro, like former three-term Senator Smart Afolabi Adeyemi, CON, threw in the towel in writing. He said he did so in the interest of the APC and in deference to President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s desire for the return of a sizeable percentage of federal parliamentarians because of their experience and institutional memory. On May 17, 2026, in Kabba, stakeholders from every federal constituency in Kogi West met separately to endorse Karimi as consensus candidate. On that strength, Aro willingly submitted his withdrawal letter. The proceedings were captured on video, and videos do not lie. Karimi therefore contested almost unopposed and garnered 51,665 votes.
Yet on November 4, Justice Salim Ibrahim held the opposite. He held that the May 18 primary which produced Aro was the valid, INEC-monitored exercise. He held that the primary which produced Karimi was not monitored by INEC as required by the Electoral Act and was consequently invalid. He held that Aro has not withdrawn, directly contradicting the withdrawal letter. He ordered APC to forward Aro’s name to INEC, directed INEC to accept and publish him, and restrained Karimi from parading as candidate. He rejected the 51,665-vote result, saying INEC had no record of it. Here lies Pastor Ajileye’s million-naira question: can a person who allegedly did not participate be declared winner? If Aro participated and won, he deserves protection. But if he did not, where does the law derive authority to transform a non-participant into a winner? Has Nigeria discovered participation by judicial recognition?
There is also jurisdiction, which the court treated with levity that should alarm every lawyer. The defence, led by eminent Senior Advocates, raised a fundamental objection: the action was statute-barred, having been instituted outside the 14 days prescribed by Section 285(9) of the Constitution. This was not about punctuation or the colour of a result sheet. It touched the very jurisdiction of the court. Jurisdiction is not decorative. It is the foundation of judicial authority. Without it, even the most eloquent judgement cannot acquire legitimacy. Yet the court proceeded to grant reliefs. One would expect such an objection to receive an unmistakable determination before substance was considered. If the 14-day period applies, no sympathy can extend it. If the court found the cause of action arose on a different date, Nigerians deserve the precise reasoning.
Then there is the INEC monitoring controversy. During the primary, all Local Government returning officers, not anonymous foot soldiers but high-ranking appointees, stood before cameras. The Commissioners for Finance, Environment and Information, alongside the Special Adviser and Senior Special Assistant to the Governor, each stepped forward. One by one, they submitted results, watching as figures were counted, recorded and announced. Unanimously, they acknowledged one reality: Karimi had won. Then came the recantation. The same appointees, the same Kogi West APC Chairman Ayo Emmanuel and LGA chairmen, later denied on camera what they had affirmed on camera, after what observers described as being bought. The very men who visited Karimi at his home, ate, drank and sang his praises, are the same men now disparaging him. The videos do not lie. The results from Kabba do not lie.
Who benefits? The fingerprints are familiar. Yahaya Bello, immediate past governor who styles himself de facto leader of APC in Kogi State, has slid into political irrelevance nationally. He was in office for eight uneventful years between January 2016 and January 2024 when he handed over to his lackey, Ahmed Ododo. He left a legacy of humongous malfeasance. Between him and his proxies, including his son or nephew, Ali Bello, recycled into the Ododo government as Chief of Staff, there are several corruption cases grossing well over N200 billion to which Bello is answering. Hounded by anti-corruption agencies and desirous of ingratiating himself to the Tinubu system, Bello wants to be Senator for Kogi Central, presently held by Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan. If he wins in the Saturday, January 16, 2027 polls, he wants to be Numero Uno Kogi representative in the National Assembly.
In concert with Ododo, he hatched a scheme to deny incumbent Kogi senators their tickets. While Jibrin Usman of Kogi East was muscled out of his ticket, which went to greenhorn Joe Erico, Karimi defied the odds and won fair and square. The unrelenting Ododo and Bello duo therefore procured a desperately ambitious career participant, Samuel Bamidele Aro, who is on record to have withdrawn from the May 18 primary, to file a suit that he indeed won a primary he never participated in ab initio. Resources meant for the socioeconomic development of Kogi State were deployed to procure documents and a judgement awarding victory to Aro. Wherein lies decency? Wherein lies integrity? Wherein lies truth? Wherein lies conscience?
Let me speak directly to Aro, because this is a question of character. You know the truth. You know you did not participate. You know you withdrew in deference to President Tinubu’s call for institutional memory. You know you did not win. The people of Kogi West know. The delegates know. How do you sleep knowing the ticket you claim was not earned but engineered? How do you look the people of Yagba, Ijumu and Kabba-Bunu in the eye and tell them you are their senator-in-waiting when you did not seek their mandate? Is ambition so blind that it has consumed every shred of honour? Would a man accept a stolen crown knowing it was stolen? Politics without conscience is mere gangsterism. History is unkind to men who build careers on fraud.
To Senator Karimi, I say: do not be discouraged. Do not let this whimsical judgement break your spirit. You have stood firm when others fled. You have spoken when others kept silent about the management of Kogi State’s resources. This is not the end. It is a bend in the road. I encourage you, in the strongest terms, to immediately proceed on appeal. The Court of Appeal exists precisely to correct errors such as this. The facts are on your side. The law is on your side. The people of Kogi West are on your side. Let the higher court look at the withdrawal letter, the result sheet, the party’s affirmation, and the videos from Kabba. Let it ask the simple question this trial court refused to answer: how can a man who withdrew win?
And to the people of Kogi West, I say: remain steadfast. Remain law-abiding. Remain peaceful. Do not allow yourselves to be provoked into violence by those who profit from chaos. Your strength has always been unity across ethnic and religious lines, Ebira, Yoruba, Igala, and all who call Kogi West home. Do not allow the machinations of Bello and Ododo to divide you. They want you to fight each other while they loot your commonwealth. Refuse to be used. Stand behind your senator. Stand behind the truth. Stand behind the principle that the mandate of the people cannot be stolen in a courtroom. Once, politics in Kogi was about ideas and service.
In the end, this is not just about Karimi or Aro, or a senatorial ticket for 2027. It is about whether Nigeria will be a country where the will of the people counts, or where a few powerful men, aided by pliable judges, can overturn that will at will. It is about whether we will be a democracy or a kleptocracy dressed in democratic robes. I stand with Karimi, not because he is perfect, but because he is right on facts, law and principle. I stand against this judgement, not because I disrespect the judiciary, but because I respect it too much to watch it be reduced to a laughing stock. A court may declare a winner, but only the law can establish legitimacy. Let the appeal be filed. Let the truth be told. Let justice be done.
Tunde Olusunle, PhD, is a Fellow of the Association of Nigerian Authors (FANA), and the Nigerian Guild of Editors (FNGE) respectively