The Supreme Court on Thursday, dismissed three separate appeals brought before it by some governorship candidates seeking to nullify the election of the Akwa Ibom State Governor, Umo Eno Bassey over allegation of certificate forgery.
The appeals were those of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Young Progressive Party (YPP) and New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) and their governorship candidates in the March 18, 2023 governorship election in Akwa Ibom state.
Lead counsel to the respective parties withdrew their separate appeals following the hints from the five-member panel of Justices of the apex Court that, their appeals lacked merit.
The petition by APC and its governorship candidate, Akanimo Udofia, YPP and its gubernatorial candidate, Akpan Albert Bassey as well as that of NNPP and its governorship candidate, John James Akpan Udoedehe were thrown out by Justice Uwani Abba-Aji upon their withdrawal.
Counsel in the matters had made spirited futile attempts to convince the Supreme Court that Umo Eno Bassey and Bassey Eno Umo were not the same and as such that the governor allegedly forged his Secondary School Certificate.
Their arguments on the alleged certificate forgery did not go down well with the Apex Court Justices who queried the lawyers on whether the West African Examinations Council (WAEC) gave evidence to establish the criminal allegations.
Upon admission that WAEC did not testify in the matter, the lawyers opted and separately withdrew their appeals.
This prompted Justice Abba-Aji to dismiss them following no objections from lawyers to the various respondents in the matter.
The Court of Appeal in Lagos had in November last year affirmed the election of Governor Umo Eno Bassey of Akwa Ibom State in the governorship election held on March 18, 2023.
The appellate court in its judgment dismissed three separate appeals, filed against the governor’s election.
While affirming the September 28, 2023 judgments of the state governorship election petition tribunal, the three-member panel of Justices of the appellate court, headed by Justice Festus Obande dismissed the appeal brought by the governorship candidate of the YPP, Bassey Akpan, and his party against the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Eno, and the Peoples Democratic Party. (PDP).
Justice Obande also granted judgments in favour of the governor against the appeals of the governorship candidate of the NNPP, John Udoedehe, as well as Akanimo Udofia, of the All Progressives Congress (APC)
The appellate court declared in the unanimous judgments that all three appeals lacked merit.
In another development, the Supreme Court has reserved judgment on the appeal challenging the election of Bassey Otu of the APC as the governor of Cross River state.
The judgement was reserved after the parties adopted their briefs in the matter.
The Court of Appeal in Lagos had, in November last year, upheld the judgement of the state governorship election petition Tribunal which affirmed the election of Bassey Otu of the APC as the governor of Cross River State.
The court dismissed the appeal filed by the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Sandy Onor to challenge the decision of the tribunal delivered on 26 September.
The court resolved all the 20 issues raised in the appeal in favour of Otu and against Onor and his party.
The appellate court held that all the issues canvassed by the appellants, were pre-election matters that should have been litigated at the Federal High Court within 14 days of their happening.
The court ruled that the tribunal was right to decline jurisdiction to determine the issue of the deputy governor, Peter Odey’s membership of a political party. The issue, according to the court, is a pre-election matter and, therefore, was statute-barred.
The court also agreed with the tribunal that the appellants did not prove the alleged conflict in the names of the secondary school attended by Otu and ruled that the tribunal was right to reject the testimonies of the three petitioners’ witnesses.
The court dismissed the appeal for lacking in merit and affirmed Otu and Odey, as the duly elected governor and deputy governor of Cross River State, respectively.
READ ALSO FROM NIGERIAN TRIBUNE
