The Supreme Court on Monday dismissed the petition of Peoples Democratic Party, PDP and its candidate, Musa Wada against the declaration of Governor Yahaya Bello of All Progressives Congress, APC as the winner of November 16 Kogi election.
In the judgment delivered on their behalf by Justice Uwani Musa Abba Aji, the seven man panel of the court led by Chief Justice of Nigeria, Mohammed Tanko held that the appeal was devoid of merit.
It was accordingly dismissed in the unanimous judgement.
The panel held that the petitioners abandoned their pleadings on their written briefs that the election was marred with irregularities at the lower courts.
The panel therefore ruled the petitioners failed to prove their allegations with results from the election and failed to prove that the respondent did not win majority votes in the election.
It also ruled that the petitioner failed to prove its claim of electoral malpractices by calling polling unit agents as witnesses.
The panel held that the appellant only proved over-voting in 24 out of the 729 polling units where voting was conducted.
Governor Bello’s victory had earlier been affirmed at the Kogi Governorship Election Petition Tribunal and the Court of Appeal on the grounds that Wada and his party failed to prove the allegations of electoral malpractices in their petition.
