Appeal court affirms Okpebholo’s election as Edo governor

The court of appeal in Abuja has upheld the judgment of the Edo state governorship petitions tribunal, which affirmed the election of Monday Okpebholo as governor of the state.

Delivering judgment on Thursday, a three-member panel of the appellate court dismissed the appeal filed by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its candidate, Asue Ighodalo.

Mohammed Danjuma, who delivered judgment on behalf of the panel, held that the appeal was devoid of merit.

Danjuma said both PDP and Ighodalo failed to establish their claim that the tribunal erred in its judgment by affirming Okpebholo’s election.

However, the appeal court held that the tribunal erred in admitting the BVAS machines presented by the petitioners as evidence.

Consequently, the court expunged the evidence of the 133 BVAS machines tendered at the tribunal by the petitioners.

The court said the tribunal did not comply with relevant statutes for tendering such documentary evidence when it admitted the BVAS machines.

The court further held that the tribunal was correct to find that the PDP and its candidate “dumped” evidence on it without clearly demonstrating non-compliance and over-voting in line with the Electoral Act.

The appellate court held that the petitioners failed to call witnesses to speak to the exhibits they tendered and that the few witnesses presented by them testified on issues “unrelated” to the matters before the tribunal.

BACKGROUND

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had declared Okpebholo, candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), as winner of the election.

Okpebholo polled 291,667 votes to defeat his closest challenger, Ighodalo of the PDP, who got 247,274 votes. Olumide Akpata, candidate of the Labour Party (LP), finished a distant third with 22,763 votes.

Ighodalo and PDP had approached the tribunal to challenge the outcome.

The petitioners told the court that the governorship election was invalid because of alleged non-compliance with provisions of the Electoral Act 2022.

They prayed the court to nullify the declaration of Okpebholo as winner, alleging that the election was marred by irregularities.