Supreme Court dismisses Ighodalo’s suit, upholds Okpebholo’s election

By Alade Adisa

The Supreme Court on Thursday dismissed the appeal filed by the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, in the last governorship election in Edo State, Asue Ighodalo and affirmed the election of Senator Monday Okpebholo of the All Progressives Congress, APC.

In a unanimous decision by a five-member panel led by Justice Mohammed Garba, the apex court dismissed as lacking in merit, the appeal by Mr Ighodalo.

Mr Ighodalo has sought that the apex court nullify the election.

He alleged that the poll was manipulated and did not comply with the provisions of the Electoral Act.

According to the Supreme Court, it found no reason to set aside the concurrent judgments of both the Court of Appeal and the Edo State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal, which returned Okpebholo of the APC, as the valid winner of the gubernatorial contest.

It held that the Appellant failed to adduce credible and admissible evidence to substantiate his claim that the election was marred by irregularities that included over-voting and substantial non-compliance with provisions of the Electoral Act.

Likewise, it held that the Appellant failed to call relevant witnesses to demonstrate some of the evidence he tendered in support of his case, especially the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System, BVAS, machines.

It held that some of the proof of evidence, which were tendered from the Bar, were merely dumped on the tribunal without establishing alleged non-compliance in 432 out of a total of 4,519 polling units in the state.

A three-member panel of the Appeal Court, led by Justice M. A. Danjuma, had earlier declined to nullify Governor Okpebholo’s election.

The appellate court upheld the May 15 judgement of the tribunal which validated the result of the election announced by the INEC.