Ondo State Governor, Rotimi Akeredolu, has asked the Court of Appeal to upturn a judgment of an Ondo State High Court sitting in Akure, which barred the state government from dissolving the local government administrations in the state.
The case would come up on Monday at the Appeal Court sitting in Akure, the state capital.
The governor’s request to the appellate court was served by the state’s Ministry of Justice, on the counsel to the 18 local government chairmen and councilors, Olusola Oke, Punch reports.
The chairmen and councillors were elected on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party in April last year.
It would be recall that the Ondo State High Court had on January 17, this year, ruled on a suit filed by the 18 local government chairmen and councillors, led by their chairman, David Alarapon (Chairman of Akure South), that the state government, either by their agents or servants, had no right to remove the elected officials until their tenure expires.
In the judgment delivered by a former state Chief Judge, Justice Olasehinde Kumuyi (who retired recently), the court upheld the claims by Alarapon and 34 others, among whom were councillors, that the council officials were democratically elected to serve for a tenure of three years which would end on April 25, 2019.
However, the newly-sworn in governor asked the court to step aside the earlier judgment of the high court and sack the chairmen across the local governments in the state.
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