The All Progressives Congress (APC) and its governorship candidate in the November 11, 2023 governorship election in Bayelsa state, Chief Timipre Sylva have raised allegations of bias and denial of fair hearing against the State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal sitting in Abuja.
The APC and its governorship candidate are challenging the declaration of Governor Duoye Diri as the winner of the election.
When the case was called on Monday, counsel to the petitioners, Mr R. O. Balogun (SAN) informed the Tribunal of a petition and letter written to the President of the Court of Appeal and the Secretary of the Tribunal, complaining of bias and lack of fair hearing.
Balogun said the petition specifically asked the Appeal Court President to disband the panel and constitute a new one, adding that, the petitioners still have up till May 28, for the expiration of their petition and urged the Tribunal to adjourn further proceedings, pending the decision of the President of the Court of Appeal.
Although, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Diri, and his deputy, Senator Lawrence Ewhrujakpo, had initially opposed the request for adjournment, but made a u-turn, after the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), pointed out that it is the petitioners’ case and they can spend the whole year, arguing it.
According to the petitioners, record of proceedings obtained so far showed that observations and comments made by the Tribunal suggested that the panel of Justices of the Tribunal had already made up their minds to favour the respondents.
They claimed that the record showed that the Tribunal, on its own made observation in writing to the extent that the pattern of writing witness statements on oath by the witnesses called by the petitioners are the same.
The panel was equally said to have observed in the record of proceedings that the signatures of the witnesses are the same without calling experts, to establish so.
While pointing out that the panel had already concluded that the polling unit results tendered by the petitioners were fake, they submitted that it was wrong for the Tribunal to make the observation on the record of proceedings.
Based on the above, the petitioners said, they no longer have faith and confidence in the panel and urged the panel to suspend further hearing of their petition until their petition is resolved by the president of the Court of Appeal.
Consequently, the three-member panel of the Bayelsa State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal adjourned hearing in the petition filed by Sylva and his party against Diri’s election indefinitely.
The adjournment, which is at the instant of the petitioners was to await the decision of the Court of Appeal President, Justice Monica Dongban-Mensem, on a petition against the three-member panel led by Justice Adekunle Adeleye.
The Tribunal had last week adjourned till Monday, March 4 for INEC to open its defence of the November 11, 2023, governorship election that produced Diri as re-elected Governor of Bayelsa State.
According to former governor and immediate past Minister of State for Petroleum, Chief Timipre Sylva, and the APC, who are challenging INEC’s declaration of Diri as the winner of the November 11 governorship poll in Bayelsa State, the electoral umpire denied them of votes in their “strong areas”, when it cancelled results in three Local Government Areas of Nembe, Ogbia, and Southern Ijaw, on alleged disruption of the electoral process and diversion of electoral materials.
However, after calling 52 witnesses, out of the 224 lined up to prove their allegations against the election, the petitioners announced that they were satisfied with the prosecution of their case and closed it.
Following the closure of their case last week, the panel fixed March 4, for the respondents to open their defence.
However, the respondents could not open their defence due to the petition against the panel.
It be recalled that INEC declared Diri and the PDP winner of the November 11, 2023 governorship election in Bayelsa State, having won majority of the lawful votes cast at the election.
According to the Returning Officer, Professor Faruq Kuta, the PDP and Diri polled 175, 196 votes to defeat his closest rival, Timipre Sylva of the APC who scored 110,108 votes.
Dissatisfied with the outcome of the election, Sylva and his party approached the Tribunal to challenge the declaration of Diri as winner of the November 11 governorship election.
The petitioners are asking the Tribunal to hold that, contrary to the position of INEC, election was held in some polling units and winners declared at the said units and added that it was wrong of INEC to disregard the results at the ward and local government level.
They said in their joint petition that, if the said cancelled results were restored by the court, they would emerge winner of the November 11 governorship election.
However, the respondents, especially INEC which conducted the election submitted that election in the three local governments of Southern Ijaw, Ogbia, and Nembe, did not hold due to incidents of alleged diversions of materials and disruption of the electoral process over alleged bypass of the BVAS machine.
They had tendered Form EC40G to confirm that there were no elections in the said polling units, in addition to the Certified True Copies (CTCs) of results from INEC to prove that the results brought before the court as evidence that election held at the polling units were forged by the petitioners.
