Just in: Supreme Court affirms Governor Peter Mbah’s victory
The Supreme Court has affirmed the election of Governor Peter Mbah of Enugu state.
Justice Mohammed Garba, delivered the lead judgement on Friday.
He described as a mere allegation the statement that Mbah did not possess the National Youth Service Corp certificate, which is one of the certificates he tendered to the INEC.
The Court resolved all the issues raised in the appeal against the appellant.
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The appellant, Chijioke Edeoga of the Labour Party, had dragged INEC and Mbah before the court to challenge the decision of the Court of Appeal which dismissed his case against the election of the governor.
The Lagos Division of the Appeal Court in its unanimous decision, resolved all three issues argued against the appellant.
The three-member panel presided over by Justice Tani Hassan then held that the appellant failed to prove that the respondent was not qualified to contest the governorship election.
On the allegation of over voting, Hassan, in her lead judgement, held that the voters’ register was never placed before the lower Tribunal, stressing that failure to tender the voter’s register before the lower Tribunal rendered the appeal inadmissible.
The court also held that the testimony of all the witnesses presented by the appellant did not prove that there was over-voting in the governorship election.
Consequently, the court dismissed the appeal for lacking in merit and affirmed the judgement of the election tribunal which upheld the election of Mbah of the PDP as Governor in the March 18, 2023, election.
The Independent National Electoral Commission had declared Mbah of the PDP as the winner of the poll.