Sokoto PDP guber candidate goes to appeal court, lists nine reasons Gov should be removed

The Sokoto State governorship candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the 2023 general elections, Sai’du Umar, has approached the Supreme Court with nine grounds of appeal against the judgment of the Elections Petition Tribunal and that of the Court of Appeal.

Umar and the PDP listed nine grounds upon which they are asking the Supreme Court to set aside the concurrent judgments of the election petition tribunal and the Court of Appeal which affirmed the election of Governor Ahmed Aliyu.

In the appeal documents, which were made available to journalists by the media assistant to the candidate, Nafiu Lema, filed on their behalf by their team of lawyers led by Mr Sunday Ameh (SAN), the appellants claimed that “the judgment of the Court of Appeal is against the weight of evidence”, and as such should be set aside by the apex court.

Ripples Nigeria recalls that the three-member panel of the appellate court, had, in a unanimous judgment last month held that the appellants failed to substantiate allegations of irregularities, noncompliance as well and non-qualification contained in their appeal.

Justice Mbaba Bassi, who delivered the lead judgment, held that the tribunal was right in expunging evidence of non-compliance and other alleged irregularities and malpractices because the evidence was presented by incompetent witnesses.

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According to Justice Bassi, the failure of the appellants to list and front-load the statements of the witnesses was fatal to their case.

The PDP candidate and the PDP had presented INEC’s form EC40G (incident form; showing elections were cancelled due to over-voting or disruption.

However, the appellate court, said the form EC40G, “shows electorate were allowed to vote but something went wrong culminating in the cancellation of the election.”

While stating that he doesn’t think it was necessary to call any person to speak again to such documents in line with Section 137 of the Electoral Act, Justice Bassi observed that precedence already set by the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court in related matters demand that the appellants lead oral evidence to support the allegation of manipulation of votes through the cancellation of election in 138 polling units.

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