The Supreme Court on Monday upheld the return of Yahaya Bello as the winner of the last governorship election in Kogi State.
In two judgments delivered by Justice Uwan Abba Aji, the court’s seven-man panel, led by the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Justice Ibrahim Mohammad dismissed the two appeals decided on Monday.
The first, marked: SC/388/2020 was the appeal by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its candidate in the November 16, 2019 governorship election in the state, Musa Wada.
The second, marked: SC/434/2020 was by he Social Democratic Party (SDP) and is candidate, Natasha Akpoti.
In the first judgment authored by Justice John Okoro, but read by Justice Abba Aji, the court resolved the five issues identified for determination, against the PDP and Wada.
The court held that the appellants were wrong to have claimed that the Court of Appeal denied them fair hearing and that it determined their appeal on issues it raised suo motu (on its own volition).
It further held that, as against the claim by the appellants, the Court of Appeal merely arrived at its conclusion that the forensic expert called by the PDP and Wada at the tribunal (PW19) was not a dactylographer from records of proceedings.
The court held that the decision taken by the appellants’ lawyers, in abandoning two of the three grounds of their petition, fatally affected the their case.
It added that it was wrong for the appellants to accuse the Court of Appeal and the tribunal of determining their case on extraneous issues when in fact, it was on record that their lawyer admitted abandoning grounds B and C of the petition, relating to corrupt practices and non-compliance with Electoral Act.
The court held that there was evidence, at page 4886 of volume 12 of the records of appeal, where the petitioners’ lawyer admitted abandoning grounds B and C and thereby narrowing her case ground A, which reduced the scope of the contest of the election from 21 Local Governments to seven.
“The abandonment of the two grounds literally snuffed out life from the petition. The statement by the lawyer, (as captured at page 4886 of volume 12 of the records of appeal) was like a killer punch, though self inflicted.
“It follows that the appellants, having abandoned grounds B and C, they are left with only ground A.
“That means that all paragraphs and evidence led in respects of the abandoned grounds amount to waste,” the court said and proceeded to uphold the position of the lower court on the issue.
The Supreme Court also upheld that decision of the Court of Appeal to strike out portions of the petition containing allegations of criminal conduct against individuals who were not made parties to the case.
The court further held that the appellants failed in proving the only surviving ground of the appeal – ground A, relating to claim that Bello was not validly elected with majority of lawful votes.
It held that the appellants failed to lead relevant and sufficient evidence to sustain their clam of corrupt practices and other malpractices in the seven Local Governments in which they challenged the election.
The court noted that the appellants called witnesses from only 24 polling units out of the 729 polling units in the seven LGs complained of.
It added that the appellants merely dumped documents on the tribunal without calling witnesses to demonstrate their relevance and linking them to the appropriate parts of the case.
The court held that the appellants miscalculated in not calling polling unit agents, which miscalculation was fatal to their case.
It faulted the appellants’ assertion that the irregularities complained of were of technical nature, which informed why they relied on evidence by forensic analyst and statistician as against polling unit agents.
The lead judgment in the appeal by the SDP and Akpoti was authored by Justice Abba Aji, who equally read it on Monday.
In dismissing the appeal, the court resolved the two issues identified for determination against the appellants.
The court held that the Court of Appeal was right in upholding the decision by the tribunal to strike out the name of the Bello’s running mate from the petition, because running mates are not known parties to election petitions under the law.
It held that the appellants failed to prove their claims that Bello and his running mate were not qualified to have stood for election and that they made false claims about their qualifications to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
As against the claim by the appellants, the court found that there was no evidence that the SDP’s logo was excluded from the election by INEC
The court awarded no cost to any party to the two appeals.
Beside Justce Muhammad (the CJN), Justices Okoro and Abba Aji, other embers of the panel were Justices Olabode Rhodes-Vivour, Sylvester Ngwuta, Kudirat Kekere-Ekun and Amina Augie.
