The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has said the All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate, Uba Sani won the governorship election held in the state.
This was even as it invited the Kaduna State Governorship Election Tribunal to note a major constitutional error in the petition brought by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), challenging the outcome of the 18 March 2023 poll.
In its reply to the petition marked KPT/KD/GOV/4/2023 and filed on 6 May 2023, the incumbent governor and candidate of the ruling APC, Uba Sani, won the election fair, square and lawfully returned as the victor.
The reply of the commission contained both its preliminary objection to the petition brought by PDP and its candidate, Mohammed Ashiru Sani, and point-by-point response to all the allegations raised by the petitioners, against the conduct of the poll and its final outcome.
Results of polling units being disputed by the petitioners were also analysed in the reply of the electoral body, which also indicated that it would be calling witnesses from its election operations and ICT departments, to prove the integrity of the poll and the votes scored by each of the participating candidates.
Leading a team of Senior Advocates, Abdullahi Aliyu, SAN, also listed 29 documents that the Commission would rely on, if the petition isn’t dismissed at the preliminary stage and gets to full trial.
In its preliminary objection highlighting the 47-page reply, the electoral body claimed that the constitutional error is signalled and has rendered the judicial challenge mounted by the petitioners, incompetent, and only fit, for dismissal.
Ashiru and PDP listed INEC, the governor and his party; the All Progressives Congress (APC), as respondents.
Putting the tribunal on notice, INEC said it, “shall, before or at the hearing of this petition, challenge, by way of preliminary objection, the competence of this petition and shall urge this Tribunal to strike out or dismiss same.”
Delving into the constitutional error committed by the petitioners, INEC noted “A ground in an election petition contending that “the respondent was not duly elected by the majority of lawful votes cast at the election” is cognisable only where 2 candidates contest in a run-off under Section 179 (4) of the Constitution of the FRN, 1999.
“By the table drawn in paragraph 7 of the petitioners’ petition, there were 14 candidates that contested the Governorship election conducted by the 1st Respondent (INEC) in Kaduna State on the 18th day of March 2023.
“Section 134 (c) of the Electoral Act, 2022 cannot be relied upon as a competent ground in this petition where the 2nd Respondent (Uba Sani) was declared as the winner under Section 179 (2) of the Constitution of the FRN, 1999, which requires the winner to only score the highest number of votes cast at the election.
“A competent ground in a petition under Section 134 (c) must be couched as “the respondent was not duly elected by a majority of lawful votes cast at the election.
“The petitioners in Ground 1 of the petition couched their ground as “the 2nd and 3rd Respondents were not duly elected by a majority of lawful votes cast at the election.
“The petitioners have expanded the provision of Section 134 (c) of the Electoral Act, 2022. No facts were pleaded distinctly to support Ground 1 in the petition. Ground 1 is incompetent,” the commission averred.
The Commission further claimed that “The petitioners’ Ground 1, to the effect that the 2nd and 3rd Respondents (Sani and APC), were not duly elected by the majority of lawful votes cast at the election pursuant to Section 134(1)(c) of the Electoral Act, 2022, is bereft of supporting facts in the entire petition, hence, deemed abandoned.
“The petitioners now snuffed those distinct grounds under different provisions of enabling law on different facts, thereby rendered the grounds and the supporting facts as set out in paragraphs 12-42 of the petition, incompetent and liable to be struck out.
“The striking out of those paragraphs, which form the material pleadings in the petition, renders the petition, hollow. Therefore, the petition, as presently constituted as narrated above, does not confer any jurisdiction on this honourable tribunal, to entertain the same,” the Commission reasoned.
In a keen contest, the governor edged Ashiru, his main opponent, with just 10,804 votes, sparking a fierce judicial challenge, to overturn the governor’s victory.
Meanwhile, the governor has hired a legal team of Senior Advocates and other lawyers, led by a former Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Chief Bayo, to prosecute the legal battle.
The Ojo-led team also filed a preliminary objection, similar to INEC’s, seeking for an early termination of the petition.
Recent Supreme Court’s pronouncements on election appeals, which touched on alleged election fraud and result cancellation, put the governor in good stead, to keep his seat, if the petitions against him, with Ashiru’s, being the strongest, go to full trial.
The apex court, in preserving the Osun governorship seat for Ademola Adeleke of the Peoples Democratic Party, held that the electoral commission wasn’t duty-bound, to transmit election results in real-time, adding that manual accreditation must also be factored into determining those who are accredited to vote in an election, when IREV and BVAS, are being employed as primary sources of proving alleged rigging in any election.
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