The Osun State governor-elect, Senator Ademola Adeleke, on Thursday floored his contender, Dotun Babayemi, who challenged his emergence as the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party in the governorship election held on July 16.
Babayemi had prayed the Apex Court to set aside the lower courts’ decisions and declare him as the PDP candidate for the July 16, 2023, governorship election in Osun State.
The five-member Justices of the apex court, presided over by Justices Amina Augie, held that the appeal, as filed by the appellant, was filed out of time as a pre-election matter, which is time-bound.
While stating that “a pre-election matter has a period of 14 days, and like a rock of Gibraltar, cannot be moved”, the court added that there was nothing before the court to invoke its jurisdiction.
Counsel to the appellant, Adebayo Adelodun (SAN), tried to convince the panel to consider the appeal’s merits, but the court held that it lacked jurisdiction to entertain the matter.
The Appeal, having been withdrawn by the counsel to the appellant, the court consequently dismissed it.
Prior to the Osun 2022 governorship election, different primaries produced Babayemi and Adeleke, but the National Working Committee of the PDP and the Independent National Electoral Commission recognised Adeleke as the party’s authentic candidate.
Babayemi challenged Adeleke’s recognition as the party candidate before the Federal High Court and the Court of Appeal Court but lost. He approached the Supreme Court after Adeleke emerged as the party’s authentic candidate because the right delegates voted for him.
In his judgment on May 18, Justice Nathaniel Ayo-Emmanuel of the Federal High Court in Osogbo upheld the governorship primary that produced Adeleke.
Also, the Court of Appeal, Akure Division, in its judgment of July 20 on the appeal filed against the decision of the Federal High Court, Osogbo, aligned with the lower court and dismissed Babayemi’s appeal.
Babayemi then appealed to the Supreme Court, asking it to set aside the judgments of the lower courts and declare him the PDP’s governorship candidate for the Osun State governorship election.
However, his appeal was dismissed by the Supreme Court for being filed out of time and lack of jurisdiction in a unanimous decision of the five-member panel delivered by Justice Amina Augie.
