S'COURT DELIVERS VERDICT ON KANO, PLATEAU, LAGOS, 4 OTHERS TODAY

Sandy Onor of PDP, who polled 179,636 votes.

In Zamfara State, the battle was between Governor Dauda Lawal and former Governor Bello Matawalle. INEC had declared Lawal of PDP governor winner and said he scored a total of 377,726 votes to defeat then incumbent governor, Matawalle, who scored 311,976 votes.

Lawal's election was also affirmed by the Zamfara Election Petitions Tribunal last September, after dismissing Matawalle's petition for being incompetent and lacking in merit.

Besides, the tribunal awarded a sum of N500, 000 fine against the petitioners for filing the petition.

However, a three-member panel of the Court of Appeal, led by Justice Oyebisi Folayemi, nullified the return of Lawal as winner of the governorship poll. The court ordered INEC to conduct a fresh election in three local government areas of the state, where elections had not been held previously or where results from various polling units were not counted.

Dissatisfied, Lawal had approached the apex court to set aside the judgement of the appellate court and sustain the judgement of the tribunal, which affirmed his victory at the poll.

However, not much was expected in the Bauchi and Ebonyi states governorship appeals, since the apex court hardly upturned concurrent findings of the lower courts, especially when new and convincing evidence were not presented at the hearing.

Meanwhile, judgement in the Ogun State appeals were reserved to a date that would be communicated to parties in the suit.

PDP's candidate, Oladipupo Adebutu, through his lawyer, Chief Chris Uche, SAN, pointed out that the case of the appellants was misconceived at the lower courts. Uche added that evidence were presented before the tribunal to prove that results from 99 polling units with votes of over 40,000 were cancelled.

He argued that the said 40,000 votes were far more than the margin of 13,000 votes between Abiodun and Adebutu.

He submitted that INEC was wrong to have gone ahead to declare results of the March 18 governorship election in Ogun State, when the issue of cancelled votes in 99 polling units had not been resolved.

However, all the respondents, citing Section 179 of the constitution, argued that the election of a governor could not be challenged on the grounds of margin of lead.

Justice Okoro subsequently announced that judgement had been reserved, after taking submissions from parties.

However, the coast was yesterday cleared for Governor Umo Eno of Akwa Ibom State, following the dismissal of three separate appeals challenging his declaration as governor.

The appeals by APC, Young Progressives Party (YPP), and

NNPP were all dismissed shortly after they were withdrawn by their respective lawyers.

They took the hint of the apex court to withdraw them after being confronted with the facts that the appeals were incompetent as they did not provide any new facts or evidence that would warrant the setting aside of the concurrent judgements of the tribunal and Court of Appeal.

In the appeals, cantered on alleged non-qualification and certificate forgery, the appellants' lawyers made efforts to convince the panel of the apex court, led by Justice Mary Uwani Abba-Aji, that Emo Eno Bassey and Bassey Eno Emo on the West Africa Examinations Council (WAEC) certificate submitted to INEC were not the same and as such the governor allegedly forged his Secondary School Certificate.

However, the justices pointed out that no matter the colouration given to the issue, it remained a pre-election matter and a criminal one, which must be proved beyond reasonable doubt. They added that the two lower courts were right in their decisions to dismiss the individual cases of the appellants.

The Court of Appeal in Lagos had in November last year affirmed the declaration of Eno as winner of the March 18, 2023 governorship election in Akwa Ibom State. The appellate court in its judgement dismissed three separate appeals filed against the governor’s election.

While affirming the September 28, 2023 judgement of the election petition tribunal, the three-member panel of the appellate court, led by Justice Festus Obande, dismissed the appeal brought by the governorship candidate of the Young Progressives Party, Bassey Akpan, and his party against INEC, Eno, and PDP.

Obande also entered judgment in favour of the governor against the appeals of the governorship candidate of NNPP, John Udoedehe, as well as Akanimo Udofia of APC

The appellate court declared in the unanimous judgements that all three appeals lacked merit.

Meanwhile, PDP, yesterday, congratulated Eno on the judgement of the Supreme Court, which upheld his victory at the March 18, 2023 governorship election.

According to a statement by the National Publicity Secretary, Debo Ologunagba, the party said, ''This judgement of the Supreme Court, the highest and final court in our country, is victory for democracy and the decisive triumph of the will of the people of Akwa Ibom State in their determination to preserve good governance in their state.

"Our party is proud of his capacity for leadership, especially in hitting the ground running upon inauguration, with the launching of the ARISE Agenda, leading to monumental achievements in the delivery of life-changing citizen empowerment programmes and projects in critical sectors including agriculture, education, healthcare, security, housing, road infrastructure, manufacturing, commerce, aviation, among others."