By Jethro Ibileke
The Court of Appeal Sitting in Abuja, the FCT, on Thursday reserved for judgement, an appeal filed by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its candidate in the September 21, 2024 governorship election, Asue Ighodalo, challenging the judgement of the State election petition tribunal.
The three-man panel presided over by Justice M. A. Danjuma, said the date would be communicated to the lawyers of all the parties in the case.
The PDP and Ighodalo had approached the appellate court, following the judgement of the tribunal which affirmed the declaration of Monday Okpebholo of the APC as winner of the election.
Governor Monday Okpebholo also urged the Court to dismiss the appeal filed by PDP and its candidate for lacking in merit.
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) also made similar request.
Lawyer to Okpebholo, Onyechi Ikpeazu (SAN) urged the court to affirm the judgment of the tribunal which upheld his client’s victory and found that the PDP and Ighodalo failed to prove their allegations that the election was marred by irregularities.
Ikpeazu argued that the petition, which they filed before the tribunal and the appeal constitute totally academic exercise.
He stated the appellants conceded at the tribunal that if the votes, which they claimed were wrongly added, were deducted, Okpebholo and the APC still scored the majority votes.
Ikpeazu argued that as against the claim by the appellants that the serial numbers of the ballot papers were not filled on the Form EC25B, the form actually did not contain any provision the recording of serial number.
He said what is provided for in Form EC25B are spaces for the imputation of information about the quantity of materials received and quantity materials returned.
Ikpeazu states that in the Form EC40A, which the appellants tendered at the tribunal, the serial numbers of the ballot papers were clearly indicated.
He noted that while the appellants pleaded Form EC25D in their petition, they failed to tender the forms before the tribunal.
He argued that the ward collation officers are not bound by the results uploaded to IREV where there is over voting.
Ikpeazu also argued the cross appeal filed by Okpebholo and the APC and urged the Court of Appeal to allow the cross appeal and dismiss the appeal.
Emmanuel Ukala (SAN) for the APC and Kanu Agabi (SAN) for the INEC also argued in similar manner in praying the court to dismiss the appeal and affirm the judgment of the election tribunal.
Ukala argued that the position of the law has not changed even with the introduction of Sections 73(2) and 137 of the Electoral Act 2022 that a petitioner alleging any form of non compliance must call witnesses from all the affected polling units to prove the allegations.
He added: “Where there is improper collation, you still need to call witnesses polling unit by polling unit.”
While arguing that the Ighodalo and the PDP failed woefully to lead sufficient evidence to prove their case, Ukala said the tribunal held rightly when it found that the petitioners failed woefully in that regard.
He noted that in this case, the petitioners called a total 19 witnesses at the tribunal, out of which only five were polling unit agents, who were required to give evidence in respect of the 765 polling units that they were complaining about.
Ukala also noted that while the appellants pleaded Form EC25D in the petition as one of the forms they intended to rely on at trial, they did not produce them at trial.
He said the Form EC25D is where the serial number ought to be reflected as against Form EC40D claimed by the appellants.
After taking arguments from lawyers to parties, the Court announced that judgment is reserved to a date to be communicated to the parties.
