The Court Of Appeal has announced that it will deliver judgement on the appeal by the candidate of the Labour Party, Chijoke Edeoga against the judgement of the Tribunal on Friday, November 10 2023.
Edeoga had approached the tribunal to challenge the declaration of Mbah as the winner of the March 18th poll by the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC on the grounds that Mbah wasn’t qualified to stand for the election, forged his National Youth Service Corps, NYSC certificate and cases of over-voting in Udenu, Nkanu East and Enugu East local government areas.
The Tribunal chaired by Justice Kudirat Murayo Akano dismissed all grounds of petition.
The panel held that NYSC isn’t a requirement for contesting for the office of the Governor and there’s no where that the NYSC Certificate was attached to the documents Mbah submitted to INEC by the respondent.
On the issue of forging NYSC Certificate, the panel discountenanced all the evidences by the DSS, NYSC official and others because they weren’t in compliance with paragraph 4, subsection 5D of the evidence act. Only the witness of the PW 26 which was described as a hearsay by the panel and those not help the petitioners and therefore resolved the issue of Certificate Forgery in favour of Mbah.
On the issue of wrong computation of results of the Labour Party in Udenu local government, the panel said they petitioners failed to prove this case and the witnesses they called gave the same report for different polling units and wards and wondered why their testimonies are they same even from different locations.
The panel also said that the witnesses presented by the Labour Party weren’t duly accredited agents by INEC and makes their testimony invalid.
The panel based on the witnesses from the right agents in 3 polling units, deducted 51 votes from PDP and added same to Labour Party.
The tribunal held that the deduction isn’t enough to overturn the election of Mbah
In Amagu polling unit in Nkanu East the panel cancelled the votes for all parties because the witness PW 10 proved he was there and the right person.
In the remaining 11 polling units, the tribunal held that the witnesses didn’t sign the result sheet and their witnesses is discountenanced because they can’t prove they were party agents
After resolving all the matter, the tribunal dismissed the petition for lacking in merit.
The appellate court had on Monday reversed judgment on the petition after counsels to both Petitioners and respondents adopted their briefs.
