Kano governor-elect not qualify to contest election — APC

The All Progressive Congress (APC) has filed its petition before Kano governorship election petition tribunal sitting at Miller Road, challenging the victory of the governor-elect, Abba Kabiru Yusuf of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) in the immediate past gubernatorial poll in the State.

It was uncovered that the petition was filed before the tribunal through its registry on April 9, 2023.

However, the investigation conducted revealed that the petitioner in its five-volume petition informed the tribunal that the name of the state governor-elect, Abba Kabiru Yusuf is not on the list of NNPP registers that is in INEC’s custody.

According to the APC in the petition stated that prior to the governorship election polls held on March 18th, 2023, the NNPP candidate had failed to meet the requisite party membership conditions, therefore was allegedly not qualified to contest in the governorship elections on the platform of the NNPP.

It was further revealed the petitioner is requesting the court to squash the electoral mandate of Abba as he is fondly called, on the grounds of majority of lawful votes secured by the ruling APC at the polls.

The party urged the court to admit the number of unlawful votes as void, and so take into account the deduction of the number of unlawful votes, then reliant on the margin that would be left to declare the Kano governorship election as inconclusive.

However, the respondents, the NNPP and its governorship candidate and INEC have 21 days to respond to the issues raised by the petitioners.

In a related development, the court has granted the APC an exparte motion to inspect the governorship election materials, as part of the build to pursue their case against NNPP before the court.

The legal adviser, APC Kano chapter, Abdul Adamu Fagge confirmed that the APC team has commenced the inspection of the affected electoral materials in all 44 local governments.

According to him, the inspection exercise is running smoothly with support from all the relevant parties that are involved in the matter.

He expressed the optimism that there are no anticipated hitches that would derail the exercise, adding that they have been granted access to all materials so far, adding that the party would pursue the matter to a legal conclusion.

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