Abure, other suspended Labour Party leaders back in office

The embattled National Chairman of the Labour Party, Julius Abure and three other suspended members of the National Executive have staged a return to the party's secretariat after weeks away.

The quartet announced their resumption one month after Justice Hamza Muazu of the Federal High Court in Abuja barred them from parading themselves as national officers of the Labour Party.

Justice Muazu had pronounced that Abure; his National Secretary, Alhaji Farouk Ibrahim; National Organising Secretary, Clement Ojukwu and one other, should be stripped of any recognition as party executives.

The order followed the ex-parte application filed by Chief James Ogwu Onoja SAN, in which he accused Abure and co of forging documents of the FCT High Court to carry out unlawful substitutions in the just-concluded general elections.

The alleged documents included receipts, seals and affidavits of the court, which the plaintiff claimed the party officials used to carry out criminal activities.

However, addressing journalists in Abuja on Thursday, May 18, 2023, the embattled National Chairman announced that he and other suspended national officers have returned to the party secretariat following a motion for stay at the Court of Appeal.

Abure also maintained that there's no factionalisation in Labour Party, contracting the reports making the rounds to that effect.

He said, “Having appealed and file a motion for a stay which has been served on the judge, I and my colleagues have now fully assumed our constitutional responsibilities as National Officers of the party.

“It has become imperative for me to address this press conference to properly put the legal issues surrounding the leadership of the party in proper perspectives. It is pertinent to state categorically that Labour Party has no faction. It has only one leadership and that leadership is the National Working Committee led by myself, Barrister Julius Abure.”

It'd be recalled that the Lamidi Apapa-led faction had broken into the Labour Party secretariat in Abuja shortly after the court ruling last month.

Reacting to that, Abure frowned at the action which was carried out on the back of a purported restraining order granted by the FCT High Court.