The Kogi State Governorship Election
Petitions Tribunal sitting in Abuja on Tuesday dismissed the petition by
the Peoples Democratic Party and its candidate in last year’s
governorship election in the state, Idris Wada, challenging the election
of Governor Yahaya Bello.
The Justice Halima Mohammed-led
three-man panel held in its judgment that the petition jointly filed by
Wada, his running mate, Sunday Awoniyi, and their party, the PDP, lacked
merit.
The tribunal had earlier in the judgment
struck out the petition while upholding the notice of preliminary
objection raised by Bello, his party, the All Progressives Congress, and
the Independent National Electoral Commission, against the petition,
but still went ahead to determine it on its merit.
It held in its pronouncement on the
respondents’ preliminary objection that the petitioners lacked the locus
standi to challenge the nomination of Bello as the APC candidate in the
election.
The tribunal held that even if it was
wrong to strike out the petition at the preliminary stage, there was no
merit in the entire petition supporting its grounds and the prayers
sought.
The tribunal had similarly on Monday
dismissed the petition by the deputy governorship candidate of the All
Progressives Congress, James Faleke, who had contended that he, and not
Bello, was the valid substitute for the original governorship candidate
of the party, the late Prince Abubakar Audu.
Faleke had sought in his own petition
that Audu had already won the first leg of the election held on
November 21, 2015 and that there was no need for the supplementary
election.
Though the petition was dismissed on
Monday, Faleke had asked for an order declaring that he, as Audu’s
running mate in the November 21 poll, ought to have been declared as the
elected governor of the state following Audu’s death.
The tribunal ruled on Monday and
affirmed on Tuesday that the situation that could warrant Faleke to step
into Audu’s shoes as envisaged under section 181 of the constitution
had not arisen since the governor-elect and the deputy governor-elect
had not been declared by INEC at the end of the November 21 poll.
Audu was already coasting to victory
with 240,857 votes as against Wada’s 199,514 votes when he suddenly died
after the November 21 poll was declared as inconclusive by INEC.
This gave rise to a supplementary
election held on December 5, 2015 in which the APC substituted the late
Audu with Bello as its governorship candidate.
Wada had asked the tribunal to hold that
he (Wada) polled the highest lawful votes in the November 21 election
and the December 5, 2015 supplementary election and should thus be
returned as the elected governor of the state.
Wada and the PDP contended that Bello
only polled 6,885 votes in the December 5 supplementary election and
could not possibly inherit the 240,857 votes polled by Audu in the
November 21 poll.
The petitioners also contended that
Bello was not qualified to contest the election on the grounds that he
went into the race without a running mate as the deputy governorship
candidate, who ran with Audu (Faleke), had allegedly withdrawn his
candidacy before the supplementary poll held.
They also contended that the election was marred by irregularities in some parts of the states.
They, therefore, asked the tribunal to
hold that having polled a total of 204,867 votes in the November 21 and
the December 5 supplementary poll as against the 6,885 votes polled by
Bello in just the supplementary poll, Wada was the validly elected
governor of the state.
But the tribunal ruled on the
respondents’ preliminary objection and also affirmed in the judgment on
the merit of the petition that the nomination and sponsorship of Bello
as the governorship candidate of the APC was a domestic affair of the
party.
It ruled that none of the petitioners,
the tribunal or any other person who did not participate in the primary
of the party had the legal capacity to question the nomination of the
party’s candidate.
It ruled that Audu’s substitution with
Bello was valid as the latter had participated in the August 29, 2015
primary and came out as the runner-up.
Justice Mohammed also ruled that the
votes recorded in the November 21 election belonged to the various
political parties “in view of the various authorities of the Supreme
Court on who owns votes.”
It added that contrary to the
petitioners’ contention, the votes polled in the November 21 election
were not rendered unlawful or invalid by Audu’s death.
It added that INEC was right to have
collated the 240,857 votes polled by the APC “through the
instrumentality of its candidate,” the late Audu, and merged them with
the 6,885 votes recorded by the party in the supplementary poll.
The merger of the results brought the total votes recorded by the APC to 247,752.
“It is, therefore, a fact that the
240,857 votes recorded by Prince Abubakar Audu belonged to the APC,
‘adding that’ the first respondent (Bello) is entitled to benefit from
the votes acquired by his party.”
On the issue of Bello’s
non-qualification to contest the election because he allegedly had no
running mate, the tribunal held that such an issue was not part of the
conditions for qualification of a candidate to contest as governor under
section 177 of the constitution.
It held that the issue was also not part
of the conditions for disqualifying a candidate to contest such an
election under section 182 of the constitution.
It, in fact, held that Faleke remained
the deputy governorship candidate of the APC in the supplementary
election as he failed to withdraw his candidacy as spelt out under
section 35 of the Electoral Act which required him to give a 45-day
notice to his party before the election.
It held that the letter he wrote to INEC withdrawing his candidacy as Bello’s running mate was of no effect.
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