The State and National Assembly Court of Appeal sitting in Lagos has affirmed the election of Peter Ndubuisi Mbah of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as authentic Enugu State Governor.
In its unanimous decision on Friday, the appellate court resolved all three issues against the Edeoga Chijioke Jonathan of the Labour Party (the appellant) in favour of the PDP candidate.
The 3-member panel presided over by Justice Tani Yusuf Hassan held that Edeoga failed to prove that Mbah was not qualified to contest the governorship election.
Regarding the allegation of over-voting, Justice Hassan in her lead judgment held that the “Voters’ Register was never placed before the lower tribunal, and that failure to tender the Voters Register before the lower tribunal rendered the appeal inadmissible.
The appellate court also held that the testimony of all the witnesses called by the appellant did not prove that there was over-voting in the governorship election.
The Appeal Court consequently dismissed the appeal for lacking in merit and affirmed the judgment of the election petition tribunal, which declared Mbah of the PDP as the winner of the March 18 governorship election.
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had declared Mbah of the PDP the winner of the March 18 governorship election having polled 160,895 votes.
Edeoga of the LP came second with 157,552 votes, while Frank Nweke of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA) polled 17, 983 votes to claim third place.
Dissatisfied, Edeoga and his party had approached the tribunal urging it to disqualify Mbah and declare him the winner of the election, while claiming to have polled the highest valid votes cast.
The petitioners also challenged the candidacy of the governor over an alleged forgery of a National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) certificate.
But in its judgement, the Enugu State Governorship Election Petitions Tribunal affirmed Peter Mbah as the duly elected governor of the state.
Delivering its judgment, the Governorship election petition tribunal led by Justice Kudirat Akano, dismissed the petition filed by Chijioke Edeoga, of the LP.
The tribunal held that Edeoga and his party failed to prove their case beyond reasonable doubt.
The court held that Mbah met the minimum requirements for the election which is a school certificate or its equivalent.
The tribunal rejected Edeoga’s witnesses, adding that the petitioners did not present any admissible evidence to prove that Mbah’s certificate was forged.
The tribunal said, “NYSC discharge certificate is not a qualification for governorship. Assuming that the NYSC discharge certificate of the second respondent as claimed by the petitioners was forged, is the NYSC certificate a qualification to contest for governor in Nigeria according to the constitution? The answer is no.”
