A Response to Okoi Obono-Obla
By Alex Ter Adum, PhD
Okoi Obono-Obla’s argument that Atiku Abubakar’s candidacy has been invalidated by implication of Justice Peter Lifu’s judgment of 5 November 2026 is an expansive interpretation of a judicial decision that must be approached with considerably greater legal caution.
The central question is not whether a judgment can have consequential effects on persons whose names do not appear in its text. Of course, it can. The real question is whether the orders made by Justice Lifu, properly construed within the context of the pleadings, issues submitted for determination, parties before the court and applicable law, have conclusively invalidated the nominations of Atiku Abubakar and other ADC candidates.
That question cannot be answered merely by invoking the maxim that you cannot put something on nothing.
Invalidating party leadership is not the same thing as disqualifying individual candidates.
There is a fundamental legal distinction between declaring a party’s leadership or a particular party meeting invalid and declaring individual candidates ineligible to contest an election.
Justice Lifu’s judgment concerned the legitimacy of the Mark-led leadership and the validity of certain decisions attributed to that leadership. It did not expressly name Atiku Abubakar, pronounce him disqualified, nullify his presidential nomination by a specific order or declare that he was ineligible to participate in the 2027 general elections.
Obono-Obla wants the public to accept that all these consequences automatically follow from the judgment. That is precisely the legal proposition that remains to be established.
A general order nullifying certain decisions of a party leadership cannot be stretched beyond its proper legal and factual scope to produce consequences that the court did not expressly determine. The precise reach of such an order must be established from the judgment as a whole, not from an interested party’s interpretation of it.
Macfoy v UAC does not resolve the question.
The reliance on Macfoy v UAC is misplaced as a complete answer to the controversy.
The principle that an act founded on a nullity cannot stand is well established. However, the principle does not dispense with the need to establish that the particular act in question was indeed founded on the specific invalid act declared by the court.
Was Atiku’s nomination specifically challenged? Was the validity of the presidential primary submitted for adjudication? Did the court examine the applicable provisions governing the nomination? Did it determine that the particular primary was invalid? Did it make an order setting aside that nomination?
These are not academic questions. They are central to determining whether the general orders in the Lifu judgment extend to individual nominations.
The maxim in Macfoy cannot be employed as a substitute for pleadings, evidence, adjudication and a properly framed judicial order.
Amaechi v INEC and APC v Marafa are distinguishable.
Obono-Obla’s reliance on Amaechi v INEC and APC v Marafa does not establish his conclusion.
In Amaechi, the Supreme Court was concerned with the legal consequences of an invalid substitution and the identity of the lawful candidate of the political party.
In Marafa, the validity of the party primaries was directly in issue, and the Supreme Court determined that the APC had failed to conduct valid primaries in Zamfara State. The consequences followed from that specific determination.
Neither decision establishes that every judgment concerning the legitimacy of a political party’s national leadership automatically disqualifies every candidate subsequently produced by that party.
The critical distinction is that the invalidity of a leadership structure and the invalidity of a particular electoral nomination are related but legally distinguishable questions.
One cannot simply presume the latter from the former without examining the operative orders and the legal processes through which the nominations were conducted.
The doctrine of privity cannot be used to circumvent fair hearing.
The argument that Atiku was in privity with the Mark-led leadership is equally problematic.
Membership of a political faction, political association or derivation of political benefit from a particular leadership does not automatically establish legal privity for every purpose.
The doctrine of privity has defined legal requirements. It cannot be invoked indiscriminately to impose an adverse judicial determination on an individual who was not a party to the proceedings, particularly where his personal electoral rights and nomination were neither directly litigated nor expressly determined.
The constitutional right to fair hearing under Section 36 of the Constitution cannot be displaced by an expansive application of equitable doctrines.
The question is not whether Atiku benefited politically from the Mark-led leadership. The question is whether his individual nomination was properly placed before the court and judicially determined.
Obono-Obla conveniently ignores Justice Musa Liman’s earlier judgment.
Perhaps the most significant omission in his analysis is the judgment of Justice Musa Liman delivered on 2 July 2026 in Hon. Leke Joseph Abejide v. ADC & 4 Ors, Suit No. FHC/ABJ/CS/1637/2025.
That judgment addressed the same broad controversy surrounding the leadership transition within the ADC and upheld the legal foundation of the Mark-Aregbesola leadership transition, including the relevant party processes and INEC recognition.
Justice Lifu subsequently delivered a judgment on 5 November 2026 in Nafiu Bala Gombe v. ADC & Ors, concerning a materially related leadership controversy.
The existence of the earlier judgment raises important questions about judicial consistency, the effect of decisions of courts of coordinate jurisdiction, issue estoppel where its requirements are satisfied, and whether a subsequent court can effectively reach conclusions inconsistent with the subsisting judicial determination of another court of coordinate jurisdiction.
The differences between the parties, causes of action and reliefs in the two proceedings must, of course, be examined before any definitive conclusion on res judicata can be reached. But the earlier judgment cannot simply be wished away.
Justice Lifu was not sitting as an appellate court over Justice Liman. The proper judicial hierarchy and the principle of judicial consistency cannot be ignored.
The appellate court must determine the legal reach of the judgment.
The Mark-led NWC is entitled to challenge the Lifu judgment through the appellate process which it has already filled a notice of appeal. That appeal must address not only the validity of the findings and orders but also their legal scope, their relationship with Justice Liman’s earlier judgment and whether they can lawfully be extended to individual candidates whose nominations were not specifically adjudicated.
Until those questions are resolved, it is legally irresponsible to announce that Atiku Abubakar and other ADC candidates have been conclusively disqualified from the 2027 elections.
This is not to suggest that the general orders in the Lifu judgment cannot raise questions about subsequent decisions taken by the disputed leadership. They certainly can. But the existence of a legal question is not the same thing as a final judicial determination of that question.
CONCLUSION
Obono-Obla is entitled to his interpretation of the judgment, but he cannot elevate that interpretation into a judicial order.
There is a difference between saying that a judgment may have consequential implications for certain nominations and asserting that those nominations have already been conclusively nullified.
The former is a legitimate subject of legal argument. The latter is an assertion that requires judicial determination.
The absence of Atiku’s name from the judgment is not, by itself, conclusive proof that he is unaffected. Equally, the invalidation of certain leadership decisions is not conclusive proof that his personal nomination has been judicially nullified.
Both propositions must be subjected to the actual orders, the applicable law and the appellate determination.
No ADC candidate has been finally disqualified, removed or disabled from contesting the 2027 general elections by an express individual disqualification order in the Lifu judgment. The legal consequences of the judgment remain subject to appellate scrutiny.
The law must not be distorted in either direction. A judgment must be obeyed, but it must also be interpretedv within its proper legal boundaries. Neither political enthusiasm nor judicial criticism should be allowed to substitute for the judicial determination of the rights of individual candidates.
Alex Ter Adum, PhD
DDG THE NARRATIVE FORCE
