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Enugu-based lawyer, Mr O. A. U. Onyeama has filed a suit at the Federal High Court in Enugu, asking it to declare Senator Ike Ekweremadu’s seat vacant.

Ekweremadu, a former Deputy President of the Nigerian Senate represents Enugu West Senatorial District in the upper legislative chamber of the National Assembly.

Ekweremadu was arrested in the United Kingdom for alleged organ harvesting and trafficking on June 22 and was subsequently remanded in custody on June 30, 2022. Since then, he has remained in detention pending his trial.

He was arrested alongside his wife, Beatrice.

However, Onyeama, a chieftain of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and former aspirant for Enugu West Senatorial Zone, which Ekweremadu represents, in the suit marked No: FHC/EN/CS/171/2022, told the court that it is the intendment and contemplation of the Constitution that Enugu West Senatorial District, shall have a functionalî representation in the Nigerian Senate.

Therefore, he said that if that representation is no longer available, his seat should be declared vacant.

Onyeama insisted that Ekweremadu has defaulted in representation, and has without cause absented from meetings of the Senate for a period amounting to more than one–third of the total number of days during which the House meets in one year.

Onyeama who expressed concern for Ekweremadu’s travails said it would be wrong to deprive Enugu West Zone of representation in the Senate.

Joined in the suit are the Senate President Ahmad Lawan; The Senate; Senator Ike Ekweremadu; Clerk of the National Assembly; PDP; National Chairman of the PDP- Iyorchia Ayu and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).