The Court of Appeal sitting in Abuja has dismissed the case filed by a former minister, state for Petroleum Resources, Timipre Sylva, against Douye Diri’s election as governor of Bayelsa State.
The judgement was delivered on Thursday by a three-man panel of the appeal court, led by Justice James Abundaga in an appeal entered by Timipre Sylva and the All Progressives Congress (APC).
The appeal commenced as a petition at the tribunal after the Independent National Electoral Commission’s (INEC) declaration of the candidate of the People Democratic Party (PDP), Duoye Diri, as the winner of the Bayelsa governorship election.
Appellant’s case
Nairametrics previously reported that Diri, who is also the incumbent governor of the state, was said to have polled a total vote of 175,196, clinching the governorship position against the All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate, Timipre Sylva.
Diri polled a total of 175,196 votes while Sylva trailed behind with 110,108 votes, making the margin a total of 65,088.
But Sylva approached the tribunal citing issues bordering on electoral malpractice and non-compliance to the electoral act.
But a three-man penal of the tribunal led by Adekunle Adeleye dismissed his petition for being contradictory, incompetent and lacking in merit.
The tribunal also held that the petitioner failed to file the statement on oath of its witnesses alongside his petition, in line with relevant laws.
Parties then approached the appeal court for redress.
At the appeal court, Diri’s legal team urged the panel to hold that the tribunal was right to have dismissed the petitioner’s petition for fielding incompetent witnesses.
They contended that the appellants failed to show proof of electoral malpractice at 184 polling units in Nembe, Ogbia and Southern Ijaw Local Government Areas.
But the appellant’s legal team urged the appeal court to rely on the testimonies of the APC candidate’s credible evidence and set aside the judgement of the tribunal.
The appellant held that elections were held in the disputed polling unit but the respondents said no election was held.
What the Appeal Court said
The appeal court held that the tribunal was not in error when it struck several paragraphs of the petitioner’s reply against the governor’s election.
Abundaga said the tribunal was right to strike out the appellants’ witnesses’ statement on oath.
The judge said it is an abuse of the court process for a party to file several processes against the same judgment.
The judge added that it has not been shown that the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) machine was tendered by the appellant before the tribunal, as evidence to prove electoral malpractice.
“The evidence of the appellant’s witnesses are hearsay and cannot be relied upon by any reasonable tribunal, ” the appeal court held saying “the appeal lacks merit is accordingly dismissed.”
The appeal court subsequently affirmed Diri’s election and awarded a cost of N500,000 each against APC and Sylva.
By this judgement, Diri’s election stands pending a final determination by the Supreme Court; this is, if the dissatisfied party is interested in testing the appeal court decision at the apex court.
