By Ngwuoke Ngwuoke with Agency reports
The Court of Appeal in Lagos has upheld the election of Peter Mbah as the governor of Enugu State.
The three-member court, in a unanimous decision, dismissed the three issues raised by the opposing party.
The panel, led by Tani Yusuf-Hassan, concluded that the Labour Party (LP) and its governorship candidate failed to provide sufficient evidence to prove that Mr Mbah of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) was not qualified to contest the election.
Regarding the allegation of over-voting, Mrs Hassan said in her lead judgement that voters’ registers were not presented before the lower tribunal.
She, therefore, ruled that the appeal failed because the petitioners failed to submit the voters’ registers for the disputed areas to substantiate the over-voting allegation.
The court also determined that the witnesses presented by the Labour Party did not sufficiently prove the existence of over-voting in the governorship election.
Consequently, the court dismissed the case for lacking in merit and upheld the judgement of the election tribunal, which had earlier affirmed INEC’s declaration of Mbah as the winner of the 18 March governorship election.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had declared Governor Mbah as winner of the governorship election with 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 place third.
Dissatisfied with the results, Edeoga and his party filed a petition, challenging Mbah’s victory, asking that they should be declared as winners on the grounds that they polled the highest number of valid votes.
The petitioners also raised concerns about the alleged forgery of a National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) certificate by Mbah.
However, the Enugu State governorship election petition tribunal ruled in favour of Mbah, stating that he met the minimum requirements for the election, which include the possessing of a school certificate or its equivalent.
The tribunal rejected Edeoga’s witnesses, adding that the petitioner did not present any admissible evidence to prove that Mbah’s certificate was forged.
NAN
