Leaders of the Social Democratic Party loyal to Shehu Musa Gabam have said the Supreme Court did not determine who controls the party in its 16 September proceedings, rejecting reports that the apex court affirmed either side in the SDP leadership dispute.
The position was set out in a statement issued in Abuja by the Bauchi State chairman of the party, Nasiru Dan Bauchi, on behalf of leaders in the Gabam camp. It puts the faction directly at odds with the account given by the party’s official leadership after the same court sitting.
According to the Gabam-aligned leaders, the matter before the Supreme Court was tied to the Osun State governorship election and the legal questions around the party’s participation in that poll. They said the appeal had become academic once the election was held, and was later withdrawn.
They drew a distinction that sits at the heart of their argument. An appeal becoming academic, they said, is not the same as the court ruling on the substantive issues, and on that basis the justices did not pronounce on the contest between Gabam and the faction led by Professor Abubakar Umar Sadiq Gombe.
The leaders urged members, journalists and the public to disregard interpretations suggesting the court had declared Gombe national chairman. They said statements by lawyers or representatives of either side should not be treated as the judgment itself, and that the only authoritative record of what was decided is the Certified True Copy of the ruling.
That plea for restraint was echoed by Chuks Uguru, counsel to the appellant, who said the proceedings concerned the Osun election rather than the leadership of the party. He said the clarification was needed because competing readings of the sitting had caused confusion among members and the wider public.
The Gabam camp also stressed a point of history. Its leaders said Gabam did not institute the original case but became involved later, and that understanding how the litigation began matters to any fair reading of what eventually reached the apex court. They called for calm and for the matter to run its course pending release of the certified judgment.
The account from the party’s recognised leadership tells a different story. Speaking to journalists after the same sitting, the SDP national legal counsel and its 2027 presidential candidate, Prince Adewole Adebayo, said the court had ended the Gabam question for good.
“The Supreme Court said that there is no life in the case and dismissed the case. That is the end of Shehu Gabam,” Adebayo said, adding that there was nothing left of the leadership crisis to revisit.
Adebayo traced the dispute to a Federal High Court judgment that directed the Independent National Electoral Commission to recognise Gabam. He said the SDP challenged that decision at the Court of Appeal, which set it aside, after which the plaintiff in the original suit took the matter to the Supreme Court.
By his account, a five-member panel led by Justice Adamu Jauro dismissed that appeal on the ground that no live issue remained. He said Gabam had already been removed from the party and had not personally challenged his removal, and that the original case was filed by another member seeking to have Gabam recognised.
The two versions do not disagree on everything. Both accept that the appeal was dismissed on the ground that it presented no live issue, and both point to the Osun election as part of the background.
Where they part company is on consequence. One side reads the dismissal as an affirmation of the Gombe-led leadership that now steers the party towards 2027. The other insists a dismissal on academic grounds settles nothing about who is the rightful chairman.
The disagreement carries real weight for the party’s standing before INEC, which recognises the officers a party presents for elections. With the 2027 general election drawing closer, control of the party structure determines who signs nomination forms and who speaks for the SDP in law.
The leadership tussle is not the only case in play. The party’s official leadership has said it is pursuing further matters at the Supreme Court touching on the electoral timetable and the windows for candidate nomination and substitution, all of which bear on how opposition parties prepare for the polls.
For now, what the court actually decided on 16 September remains contested between the two camps, and both have pointed to the same document to resolve it. Until the Certified True Copy of the judgment is released and examined, the precise scope of the ruling, and whether it touched the leadership question at all, cannot be established with certainty.