By Our Correspondent

National News – The Supreme Court of Nigeria has set aside a controversial “status quo ante bellum” order tied to the leadership dispute within the African Democratic Congress.

The ruling was delivered on April 30, 2026, bringing a decisive shift to the prolonged internal crisis.

The ruling restores the leadership structure associated with Mark and clarifies the limits of preservative court directives in political matters.

In the lead judgment, Mohammed Garba emphasised that preservative orders are temporary safeguards meant to protect the subject of litigation during active proceedings.

Such orders, the court held, cannot outlive the case itself.

Once a matter has been fully concluded, there remains no legal basis to sustain a directive aimed at preserving it.

The court also examined the procedural footing of the appeal and found it fundamentally flawed.

It held that the case did not qualify for an appeal as of right under the Constitution, noting that the lower court neither granted nor refused an injunction.

Instead, the directive in question was purely procedural.

As a result, the absence of prior leave of court rendered the appeal incompetent, affecting the jurisdictional validity of the entire process.

Beyond procedure, the apex court reaffirmed a broader judicial principle: orders designed to maintain stability during litigation must naturally expire with the proceedings they are tied to.

Retaining such an order afterward was described as legally unsustainable and without purpose.

The decision effectively nullifies the earlier directive and reinforces the necessity for courts to exercise interim powers within clearly defined limits, particularly in politically sensitive disputes.