LINUS OOTA chronicles the legal process that led to the ousting of Engr Abdullahi Sule as the Governor of Nasarawa State by the state governorship election
His tribunal agreed with the submission of the petitioners that the law is settled beyond preadventure, that the tribunal possesses the requisite power to collate the results which reflects the true intentions of the electorate from the polling unit.
“An order of this honourable tribunal directing the 1st Petitioner and be immediately sworn in as the Governor of Nasarawa State is granted. No order as to cost.” Umbugadu and the PDP had approached the tribunal, joining the APC, Abdullahi Sule, and the INEC, challenging the declaration by the INEC, noting that declaring Abdullahi Sule winner was done in error.
However, in a dissenting judgment of Hon. Justice Ibrahim I. Mashi, the opposite was the case in which the entire petition was dismissed as being unmeritorious and devoid of evidential support base or pillars. Decisions of dissenting judgment on competence of witnesses, admissibility/tendering of document on competence of petitioners’ subpoenaed witnesses
The Dissenting Judge held that the above 8 Petitioners’ subpoenaed witnesses were all witnesses who were available to the petitioners at the time of filing the petition and that PW8/PW21 by name AMA IBOM AGWU was the same subpoenaed witness whose competence was challenged in the case of ARARUME v.
The dissenting judge held that it is settled law that while polling agents and ward supervisors are competent witnesses to testify, the question as to who is an agent and how an agent can be appointed is as provided by section 43 of the Electoral Act 2022 which allows each political party in consultation with its candidate by notice in writing to REC appoint polling agents stating their names, address, contact details, passport photograph, and sample signature 14 days before the date for the...
The dissenting judge disagreed with the majority decision and held that the tribunal lacked jurisdiction to countenance documents used for the State House of Assembly election in the governorship election tribunal more so when none of those documents was used in return for the 2nd respondent or used as the basis for the petitioners’ loss and therefore they were not relevant for the purpose of prosecuting the governorship petition.
While the majority decision saw the Evidence of these 4 witnesses sufficient to restore 4, 488 votes for the petitioners and 2, 673 for 2nd and 3rd respondents, the dissenting judge disagreed and held that they were insufficient to establish that the election actually took place without any hitch. In fact, he admitted inconsistencies between his statements and the exhibits and admitted all the exhibits with the exception of A1 are not correct.
Held, contrary to the majority decision, that it is trite that over-voting is when the total votes cast outnumbered the accredited voters, and by section 51 of the Electoral Act, 2022, when such occurred, the result would be canceled. So also in Kofar Magajin Gari, Anguwan Makama accreditation failed, and yet the Petitioners claimed to overvote and wanted the party’s scores to be deducted from those polling units.
Thus 276 + 1=277, thus there was no overvoting. So also in the case of Ihankpe unit 010 in Shege1 Ward of Toto Local Government, the number of voters in Exh TOT2 and Sub237, did not exceed the total number of accredited voters. Even though the witness tendered the ID25 of his wife, he could not trace his name on the voter’s register. It was his wife’s name and not his name on the voter’s registers.
The Petitioners, therefore, were unable to establish wrongful exclusion of votes by or none collation of the same.The Petitioners claimed in Gayam, that the result of the election was inflated in favour of 2nd and 3rd Respondents by 29, 857 votes for APC instead of 9, 753 votes while that of PDP was reduced to 1, 453 votes instead of 2, 979.
The scores of the parties according to the Petitioners’ counsel are as follows: PDP- 293, 287; APC – 292, 446 leaving his earlier assertion that they would lead with 4, 130. But if you add up the figures arrived by the 2nd Respondent in his objections, the total scores of the parties would read as follows: PDP 293, 287 – 1684=291, 603; APC 292, 446 + 2, 956=295,402
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