Supreme Court reserves judgment in Kano guber dispute

The Supreme Court on Thursday reserved judgment in an appeal brought before it by Governor Abba Yusuf of Kano State, challenging the decision of the Court of Appeal, Abuja, which sacked him from office.

After hearing the submissions of counsel in the matter and the processes filed having been adopted, the five-member panel of the apex court led by Justice Inyang John Okoro reserved judgement for a date that would be communicated to parties in the appeal.

The Court of Appeal had, on November 17, in a unanimous judgement of a three-member panel, upheld the decision of the Kano State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal, which sacked Governor Yusuf of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP) and declared the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Dr Nasiru Gawuna, winner of the March 18 poll.

The appellate court dismissed the appeal filed by Governor Yusuf based on his membership status in the NNPP.

However, the judgement elicited confusion when, on Tuesday, November 21, the Certified True Copy (CTC) of the court judgement surfaced with contradictions as the CTC showed that all the issues were resolved in favour of Governor Yusuf.

The Court of Appeal acknowledged a clerical error in the CTC of its judgement and promised correction.

At the proceedings on Thursday, Chief Wole Olanipekun (SAN), representing the governor in the matter, urged the Supreme Court to set aside the decision of the Appeal Court and that of the Tribunal.

Olanipekun urged the apex court to determine whether or not the guidelines of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) will be a basis for nullifying the election victory of his candidate, who won the election by a margin of over 100,000.

He argued that this is the first time in the annals of electoral jurisprudence where an election was nullified on the grounds that ballot papers were not signed or stamped at the back, adding that INEC guidelines do not envisage that the courts would nullify an election on the basis of INEC purportedly failing to stamp ballot papers on the back.

The governor’s legal team maintained that its client’s membership of the NNPP is a pre-election matter and the appellate court lacked jurisdiction to entertain the matter

“The judgement of the lower courts is very unfair to the appellant, and we urge your lordships to upturn it,” Olanipekun submitted.

In his submissions, counsel to the All Progressives Congress (APC), Chief Akin Olujimi (SAN), maintained that the Electoral Act mandates INEC’s presiding officers to sign the back of ballot papers after the conclusion of the election.

The apex court then asked Olujimi what the findings of the tribunal on the ballots were.

Olujimi said the findings of the tribunal were simply that the ballot papers were not signed at the back and were not dated, and that electoral irregularities were manifest on the disputed ballot papers.

On the issue of party membership, he argued that the NNPP membership register did not show the name of Abba Yusuf on it.

Counsel for INEC, Abubakar Mahmoud (SAN), supported the arguments of Olanipekun and further submitted that the decisions of the lower courts were flawed.

Mahmoud said the testimony of a subpoenaed witness (PW32), which the tribunal relied on to sack Abba Yusuf, was not front-loaded along with the petition at the tribunal, contrary to the Electoral Act.

He admitted that the ballot papers were issued by INEC and told the court that it was not the duty of a voter to check if ballot papers were signed or not, but that of the party agents.

He said INEC’s contention is that the tribunal went far beyond its powers in vetting each of the ballot papers in their chambers and not in open court.

Mahmoud contended that membership is clearly an internal affair of a political party, and Abba Yusuf’s name was forwarded to INEC prior to the election while his party membership card was tendered as evidence at the tribunal.

Counsel for the NNPP, Chief Adegboyega Awomolo (SAN), said ballot papers were actually cast at the polling units, but the APC legal team did not specify the polling units affected at the tribunal in line with the rules of the court.

Justice Okoro asked him what the effect would be going forward when ballot papers that are issued by INEC are not stamped by its officials.

“Who should suffer? Is it the guy who voted, INEC, or the person who voted for?” Okoro asked.

Awomolo said ballot papers not signed ought not to affect the validity of an election and submitted that “election is the decision of the people,” insisting that the Tribunal was wrong to recount the ballots in its chambers.

The NNPP counsel added that not a single witness told the Tribunal that ballot papers were not stamped and urged the apex court to restore the 165,165 cancelled votes of Abba Yusuf and affirm his election.

After hearing the parties, the apex court reserved its judgement on the governor’s appeal for a date that would be communicated to the parties.

In the same vein, the Supreme Court also reserved judgement in the appeal filed by the governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Sadique Abubakar, against the judgement of the Bauchi State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal, which upheld Bala Mohammed’s election.

The Appeal Court sitting in Abuja on November 17 dismissed the case, which found that Governor Bala Mohammed of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) won the governorship election in Bauchi State.

The legal team of the APC candidate had urged the appeals court to declare Mohammed’s election null and void because several electoral documents used during the poll were not properly filled.

But Mohammed’s lawyers maintained that the assertions were untrue given the findings of the Tribunal.

The appeals court went on to hold that the APC candidate failed to provide credible evidence and testimony to buttress his allegations regarding electoral malpractice and non-compliance with relevant laws and consequently dismissed the appeal.

On Thursday, the APC candidate’s lawyer, Abiodun Owonikoko (SAN), told the apex court to set aside judgement, arguing that the tribunal failed to make a pronouncement on the invalid electoral documents tendered as evidence before it.

INEC’s counsel, Mohammed N., told the apex court that the tribunal only found blank spaces in some of the electoral forms and not on all the forms.

The lawyer said there was no evidence of forms that were improperly filled out at the tribunal.

Counsel for the governor, Chief Chris Uche (SAN), asked the five-man panel of the apex court chaired by Justice Inyang Okoro to dismiss the “needless appeal.”.

Uche said the appellants never brought any witnesses to speak to the electoral documents tendered at the tribunal.

“They did not have materials to support their case,” Uche argued, and he asked the court to dismiss the appeal.

After hearing the parties, the Supreme Court reserved judgement.

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