“You Can’t Pick Leaders For Us” – Labour Party Senators Yell At Senate President, Akpabio Over Minority Portfolios

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The court of appeal sitting in Abuja has dismissed the petition filed by Umar Ardo, governorship candidate of the Social Democratic Party (SDP), against the election of Ahmadu Fintiri as Adamawa governor.

Ardo and his party filed a petition at the state governorship election Petitions tribunal after Fintiri, candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), was declared winner of the poll.

The petitioner had sought the nullification of Fintiri’s election on the grounds that there was substantial non-compliance with the Electoral Act, corrupt practices, threats and violence during the voting exercise.

However, the tribunal under Justice Theodora Uloho, dismissed the petition for being incompetent and not properly filed.

“The petition is incongruous and not properly instituted before the tribunal. The petitioners are not certain about what they want,’’ she said.

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Not satisfied with the ruling, Ardo approached the appalate court seeking the reliefs sought in his petition.

In a unanimous judgment on Tuesday, the three man panel of the appeal court headed by Justice Ugochukwu Ogaku, said the appeal court agreed with the conclusions of the tribunal.

The appellate court held that the appellants did not prove the allegations of corrupt practices and non-compliance to the Electoral Act, against INEC.

He said there was no basis to grant the appeal.

“This appeal is bereft of merit. The decision of the tribunal dismissing the petition is hereby affirmed,” the court held.

The Court of Appeal sitting in Abuja on Monday affirmed Rev. Fr. Hyacinth Alia of the All Progressives Congress (APC) as the validly elected governor of Benue State.

The candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the March 18 governorship election, Titus Uba, had approached the appellate court to set aside the judgement of the tribunal, which upheld Alia’s election.

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At the tribunal, Uba, among other things, alleged that Alia’s deputy, Samuel Ode, presented a forged certificate to the Independent National Electoral Commission contrary to Section 182(1)(j) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended).

He also claimed that Alia’s name was submitted less than 180 days before the election date, and Ode was also not submitted to INEC after the party conducted a further re-run primary election.

A three-member panel of the tribunal, headed by Justice Ibrahim Karaye, dismissed the petition on the ground that it was a pre-election matter and was statute-barred.

Ruling on the appeal on Monday, the appeal court’s three-member panel led by Justice Onyekachi Aja Otisi held that Uba failed to prove beyond reasonable doubt the allegations of forgery against Ode.

She said, “The appellant failed to prove the allegation of forgery beyond reasonable doubt. No other form of EC9 was presented. To prove forgery, two documents must be produced; the original and the forged document. The appellant failed to prove an element of forgery by not making available the documents.”

Citing Section 29(5) of the Electoral Act, she held that the high court and not the tribunal have the jurisdiction to hear the matter.

She added that the appellant lacked the locus standi to challenge the qualification of the deputy governor since he was not part of the party’s primary.

She also held that the rerun primary election was conducted in obedience to a court order, adding that the timeframe prescribed for the submission of names by the Electoral Act would collapse.

“There is a difference between an election conducted based on court order and that of the Electoral Act. The timeline of the Act will collapse where there is a court order,” she added.

“The appeal hereby fails. Parties shall bear their costs,” she held.

The petition challenging the election was filed after INEC returned Alia with 473,933 votes to defeat Uba with 223,914 votes.

The service chiefs and the Inspector General of Police, IGP, Kayode Egbetokun, are currently meeting with members of the House of Representatives for a sectoral debate on the nation’s security.

The service chiefs include the Chief of Defence Staff (CDS), General Christopher Musa; Chief of Army Staff (COAS), Lt-General Taoreed Lagbaja; Chief of Air Staff (CAS), Air Marshal Hassan Abubakar, and Chief of Naval Staff (CNS), Vice Admiral Emmanuel Ogalla.

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The service chiefs and IGP were ushered in for the security sectoral debate around 11:26 a.m.

The session is to be held behind closed doors.

The meeting comes after last Thursday’s criticism of the security heads by the lawmakers for sending representatives, who were rejected.

Before the executive session, the service chiefs and IGP took turns outlining the various efforts being made to address the security situation in the country.

The Chief of Naval Staff, Vice Admiral Emmanuel Ogalla, requested that the National Assembly intervene in enhancing surveillance to cover the backwaters, creeks, and other areas behind the coastline.

According to him, if this is done, oil theft, pipeline vandalization, and illegal refining will be monitored 24 hours a day.

The House of Representatives expressed indignation last week over the absence of the service chiefs and Egbetokun at an interactive session scheduled to be held last Thursday during plenary.

Senate Committee on Electoral Matters has said that it will make it mandatory for the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to upload election results online.

The committee chairman, Senator Sharafadeen Alli, told Channels TV on Tuesday that the current law does not make it mandatory for INEC to upload results, but that the committee is working on amending the law.

He said, “That is one of the things that we are going to do. Under the current law, it is not mandatory for INEC to upload results, that is what the court has said. But as we are going forward, it is going to be mandatory.”

In addition to other electoral reforms being considered, Alli said the committee proposed resolving all pre-election matters before the election and upgrading election technology.

“We looked at elections and election petitions. In terms of legislation about election petitions, what we think is all pre-election matters resolved before the election.

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“We are also looking at a situation where election petitions are concluded before swearing in.

“We are thinking of approving the time within which to file and conclude election petitions so that somebody will not be sworn in, that is what led us into having these off-cycle elections. There would have been no need for it if we were able to conclude election petitions before the swearing in.

“We are looking at the development of technology, improvement on technology because a lot of Nigerians were disappointed when the use of the IReV didn’t work, but going forward we will try to ensure INEC do something about that,” he said.

Former President Olusegun Obasanjo, on Monday submitted that Western Liberal Democracy has not been as a system of government in Africa because it was “forced” on the continent.

Obasanjo said this while delivering his keynote address at an high-level consultation on “Rethinking Western Liberal Democracy for Africa”, in Abeokuta, Ogun state capital.

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The event attracted former Governors, Dr Kayode Fayemi (Ekiti), Sule Lamido (Jigawa) and Liyel Imoke (Cross River), former Minister of State for Defence, Erelu Olusola Obada, among others.

The former President said the Western style of democracy failed in Africa because it does not take into account the view of the majority of the people.

He noted that Western Liberal Democracy is a “government of a few people over all the people or population and these few people are representatives of only some of the people and not full representatives of all the people.”

He advocated for what he termed, “Afro democracy” in place of Western liberal democracy.

According to him, Africa countries have no business in operating a system of government which they no hands in its “definition and design”.

He said, “The weakness and failure of liberal democracy as it is practised stem from its history, content and context and its practice.

“Once you move from all the people to representative of the people, you start to encounter troubles and problems. For those who define it as rule of majority, should the minority be ignored, neglected and be excluded?

“In short, we have a system of government in which we have no hands to define and design and we continue with it, even when we know that it is not working for us.

“Those who brought it to us are now questioning the rightness of their invention, its deliverability and its relevance today without reform.

“The essence of any system of government is the welfare and well-being of the people: all the people.

“Here, we must interrogate performance of democracy in the West when it originated from and with us the inheritors of what we are left with by our colonial powers.

“We are here to stop being foolish and stupid. Can we look inward and outward to see what in our country, culture, tradition, practice and living over the years that we can learn from, adopt and adapt with practices everywhere for a changed system of government that will service our purpose better and deliver.

“We have to think out of the box and after, act with our new thinking. You are invited here to examine clinically the practice of liberal democracy, identify its shortcomings for our society and bring forth ideas and recommendations that can serve our purpose better, knowing human beings for what we are and going by our experiences and experiences of others.

“We are here to think as leaders of thought in the academia and leaders of thought with some experience in politics.”

Human rights lawyer, Femi Falana, SAN, has restated that it is wrong to punish Nigerian electorates for the negligence and mistakes of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) officials during the last general election.

Falana spoke on Channels Television’s programme on Sunday while reacting to the judgements of the appellate court sacking Governor Abba Yusuf of Kano State and Governor Caleb Mutfwang of Plateau State.

The senior advocate urged the Supreme Court to review the court of appeal decisions on the governorship election petition matters because he believed the decisions did not reflect the true wishes of the people, adding that thousands of votes should not be invalidated by the court because INEC officials failed to stamp ballot sheets.

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He added election matters ought to be concluded before the inauguration of any administration.

In the recent week, the appeal court dismissed three governors who had been certified winners in the March 2023 election by INEC. The three governors fired by the appellate court are all members of opposition parties.

The court fired Yusuf of the New Nigerian Peoples Party (NNPP) and pronounced Nasir Gawuna of the All Progressives Congress (APC) the winner of the election.

In Zamfara, the appellate court fired Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Governor Dauda Lawal after declaring the election inconclusive eight months later. The court ordered INEC to hold new elections in three of the state’s local government districts. The main contestants in the race are PDP’s Lawal and APC’s Bello Matawalle.

On Sunday, the appellate court fired Mutfwang of the PDP and directed INEC to provide a Certificate of Return to Nentawe Goshwe of the APC. The court ruled that the party had breached the court’s direction that a legal congress be convened in each of the state’s 17 local government units.

However, the appellate court upheld the election of APC Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu in Lagos State.

In response to the appellate court decisions, Falana stated that INEC failed to exercise due diligence prior to and during the elections.

He stated that anyone who is displeased with the appeal court decisions can appeal to the Supreme Court.

“If you look at what happened in Lagos is different from what happened in Plateau. You are being told in Plateau that there was a judgement of the high court to the effect that primaries have to be conducted. The judgement, as usual, was dishonoured and disobeyed and the election went on,” the senior lawyer said.
He said the political class must learn to comply with the court’s decision.

“It is different from Kano where you are being told that voters can be punished. It is a very dangerous judicial policy to sanction voters for the mistake of electoral officers. We are being told that 165,000 votes are wasted; they are invalid because some electoral officers committed an error by not stamping them. How does that affect the validity of the election?

“I do hope that this time around, the Supreme Court will resolve these needless controversies surrounding the non-stamping of ballot papers by INEC officials who have not been recommended for any sanction.

“This is why these judgements will have to be reviewed,” he added.

The Court of Appeal sitting in Abuja on Sunday affirmed the sacking of Hon. Rimvjat Nanbol of the People’s Democratic Party as the lawmaker representing Langtang Central State Constituency.

Nanbol had been sacked from the position by the National and State Houses of Assembly Election Petition Tribunal in September.

The tribunal declared Hon. Daniel Ninbol Listic of the Labour Party (LP) as winner of the state constituency election.

But the PDP Lawmaker approached the appeal court for final redress.

In a unanimous Judgment of a three-man panel of the Court of Appeal read out by Justice Okong Abang, they agreed that the Tribunal was right when it held it had jurisdiction to seat over internal affairs of a political party with regards to non-qualification and issue of sponsorship.

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Abang upheld the Tribunal’s finding that the structure of PDP had collapsed after the Plateau State High Court declared in a judgment that the party failed to conduct a valid primary/Congress involving delegates from the 17 LGAs of the state.

“It is my view that without complying with court, there was no party by the name PDP in the election.

“It is a joke taken too far” for a political party to disobey an order of court, Abang held.

The judge explained further that a court of law has jurisdiction to entertain a matter bordering on a political party especially if that party disobeys a subsisting order of a court.

“The appeal lacks merit and is accordingly dismissed. The judgment of the Tribunal is hereby affirmed,” Abang held, adding that the LP candidate remains the lawmaker representing the said Constituency at the Plateau House of Assembly.

The latest development brings to 5, the number of PDP Rep Members sacked by the appeal court in relation to the invalidated primaries of the party.

The Court of Appeal sitting in Abuja has nullified the election of Governor Caleb Muftwang of Plateau State.

A three-member panel, in a unanimous decision on Sunday, held that Muftwang was not validly sponsored by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as provided by Section 285(2) of the Nigerian Constitution.

The panel held that the appeal brought by Nentawe Goshwe of the All Progressives Congress (APC) succeeds as the issue of qualification was both a pre and post election matter under Section 177(c) of the Nigerian Constution, 1999 and Section 80 and 82 of the Electoral Act, 2022.

The panel agreed with the appellant (Goshwe) that the failure of the PDP to comply with the order of the Plateau State High Court in Jos in suit no: PLD/J304/2020 between Bitrus B. Kaze & 11 ors vs the Peoples Democratic Party & 24 ors directing it to conduct valid ward, local governments and state congresses before nominating its candidates for the various elective posts and the Court of Appeal order in CA/J1/93/2021 was a breach of the law.

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Thus, the panel set aside the judgement of the Governorship Election Petitions Tribunal for being “highly inconsistent and breach of fair hearing by relying on expunged witnesses’ statements to refuse Goshwe’s appeal”.

The panel ordered the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to withdraw the certificate of return issued to Muftwang and issue a fresh one to Goshwe.