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By Iheanyi Chukwudi
The Governorship Election Petition Tribunal sitting in Enugu, has dismissed the petitions of the Labour Party (LP) candidate, Chijioke Edeoga, his party and that of Peoples Redemption Party (PRP) candidate, Christopher Agu and his party against Peter Mbah of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), declaration and return as governor of Enugu state in the March 18 governorship election.
Dismissing the petitions on Thursday for lacking in merits, the Justice Kudirat Morayo Akano-led three-member tribunal consequently, affirmed Mbah as the duly elected Governor of Enugu
Delivering judgment in Edeoga and LP petitions, Justice Akano said, “Having resolved all issues above against the petitioners, it follows that this petition is lacking in merit and ought to be dismissed; accordingly this petition is hereby dismissed."
" We affirm the declaration and return of Mbah by the Independent National Electoral Commission as the duly elected governor of Enugu state.”
Edeoga and his party had petitioned the tribunal challenging INEC’s declaration and return of Mbah on the grounds that Mbah was not qualified to stand for the election, having submitted a forged National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) discharge certificate and cases of over-voting in Udenu, Nkanu East and Enugu East local governments.
The Tribunal which dismissed all the grounds of Edeoga’s petition held that Mbah did not submit his NYSC discharge certificate to INEC as an aid of his qualification to contest for office of the governor, since he was already qualified without NYSC certificate.
It held that NYSC discharge certificate was not a requirement for contesting for the office of the Governor and discountenance the evidences given on the issue by all the witnesses of both parties except for PW26, including those of the DSS, NYSC official and others stating that they were not in compliance with paragraph 4, subsection 5(d) of the Evidence Act.
In rejecting Edeoga's witnesses, the panel ruled that the LP governorship candidate did not present any admissible evidence to prove that Mbah's certificate was forged and resolved the issue of Certificate forgery in favour of Mbah.
On the issue of allegations of over-voting, bypass of BVAS, wrong computation of results of the Labour Party in the three local governments, the panel held that the petitioners failed to prove their case and that the witnesses they called gave the same report for different polling units and wards and wondered why their testimonies were the same even from different locations.
It also held that the witnesses presented by the Labour Party were not duly accredited agents by INEC which made their testimonies invalid.
The panel however, used the witnesses from the accredited agents in 3 polling units to make some deductions in the units which now brought Mbah’s vote down from 168,444 to 160,567 and Edeoga’s from 157, 555 to 157,551.
It held that the deduction was not enough to overturn the election of Mbah and declared that he was duly elected as governor by majority of lawful and valid votes cast at the election.
Earlier in it's judgment in Agu and PRP petitions, the Tribunal held that the petitioners failed in all their grounds of appeal.
Edeoga's Counsel, Dr. Valerie Azinge (SAN), before the panel expressed their resolve to go on appeal, as she informed the tribunal that her team though respects the panel’s judgment disagrees with it and pleaded that a copy of the judgment be made available to them immediately.
Speaking to newsmen later she said, “We’re going on appeal. Well I wouldn’t say justice or no justice, all I have said and I maintain to say is that we respect the judgment but we disagree entirely on the reasons on how the judgment was arrived at and therefore we go on appeal and exercise our constitutional rights.”
On if she was surprised at the judgment she said, “Surprised? As far as am concerned, we established the three grounds upon which we came on this petition. The issue of being satisfied or not satisfied is issue of law which will be tested on appeal.”
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