The Court of Appeal in Abuja has overturned major portions of a Federal High Court ruling that recognised a factional caretaker committee within the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), intensifying the party’s lingering leadership crisis.

In a unanimous judgment delivered by Justice Uchechukwu Onyemenam and supported by Justices Mohammed Mustapha and Okon Abang, the appellate court held that the lower court exceeded its powers by granting reliefs that were never requested by any of the parties involved in the suit.

The dispute originated from the PDP’s prolonged internal leadership battle, particularly disagreements arising from the party’s controversial Ibadan Convention held in November 2025.

Justice Uche Agomoh of the Federal High Court in Ibadan had earlier ruled in favour of the caretaker committee led by Abdurahman Mohammed and Samuel Anyanwu, declaring it the legitimate leadership structure of the opposition party.

However, the Appeal Court ruled that the trial court acted outside the issues properly brought before it.

Justice Onyemenam stated that the lower court ventured beyond the reliefs sought by the litigants by recognising and validating a factional committee that was never specifically requested in the originating processes.

According to the appellate court, such action amounted to a judicial overreach and rendered the decision legally unsustainable.

“In the instant case, there is clearly a live issue where the trial court went outside the reliefs sought to recognise and uphold a factional caretaker committee,” the court held.

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The court further noted that the legal basis upon which the Federal High Court relied had already been invalidated by a previous Supreme Court ruling concerning the PDP convention in Ibadan.

The apex court had nullified the convention conducted on November 15 and 16, 2025, declaring it null, void and without legal effect.

Building on that ruling, the Appeal Court held that any leadership arrangement, committee or political structure created from the invalid convention could not stand in law.

“Once the Convention itself has been pronounced null, void and of no effect by the Supreme Court, any superstructure erected upon it is necessarily without legal foundation,” Justice Onyemenam ruled.

The appellate court explained that although it could have considered ordering a retrial of the issues surrounding the PDP leadership structure, doing so would serve no practical legal purpose since the Supreme Court had already settled the substantive matters.

The court stressed that asking a lower court to revisit issues already determined by the apex court would amount to an abuse of judicial hierarchy.

Part of the judgment read, “This Court would be driven to the conclusion that the offending portions of the judgment, and indeed the judgment as a whole insofar as the excess permeates the decision, are a nullity and liable to be set aside ex debito justitiae.”

The court also stated that there was no longer any live dispute between the parties because both the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court had already resolved the fundamental legal questions tied to the leadership crisis.

The latest ruling effectively strips the Abdurahman Mohammed faction of the judicial backing earlier granted by the Federal High Court and marks another major legal setback in the PDP’s internal power struggle ahead of the 2027 political season.

Political observers believe the judgment may further reshape alignments within the opposition party as competing factions continue battling for control of the PDP structure nationwide.