Appeal court reverses tribunal verdict, affirms Abdullahi Sule as Nasarawa governor

The court of appeal in Abuja has affirmed the election of Abdullahi Sule as governor of Nasarawa state.

The appellate court, in a unanimous decision by a three-member panel of justices, voided the verdict of the Nasarawa governorship election petition tribunal, which sacked governor Sule, candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had declared Sule as winner of the election with 347,209 votes.

David Ombugadu, candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), polled second with 283,016 votes.

However, the PDP candidate had expressed dissatisfaction with the outcome of the governorship election, citing alleged irregularities.

On October 2, the election petition tribunal in Lafia nullified Sule’s victory and declared Ombugadu as winner of the poll.

Consequently, Sule and the APC sought to overturn the verdict of the tribunal.

‘INADMISSIBLE EVIDENCE’

Delivering judgment on Thursday, Uchechukwu Onuemenam, who read the lead verdict, held that evidence before it showed that the tribunal relied on legally inadmissible evidence to declare Ombugadu as winner of the March 18 poll.

According to the appellate court, the tribunal wrongly relied on the evidence of eight of the PDP witnesses, whose statements on oath were not front-loaded alongside the petition.

The appellate court further held that Section 285(5) of the 1999 Constitution, as amended; Section 132(7) of the Electoral Act 2022 and Paragraphs 4(5) (6) and 14(2) of the First Schedule to the Electoral Act; stipulates that every written statement on oath must be filed alongside the petition, within the statutorily allocated time.

“Where a trial court admitted and acted on an illegally inadmissible evidence, it is the duty of the appellate court to ensure that such illegally inadmissible evidence are expunged,” the judge held.

“A court of law is only allowed to act on legally admissible evidence. If documents are unlawfully allowed by a trial court, the appellate court is duty bound to exclude the documents and discountenance the evidence.”

The appellate court proceeded to strike out all the evidence and exhibits that were tendered before the tribunal by the eight witnesses.

It held that the evidence of 12 remaining witnesses who testified for the PDP candidate, were not sufficient to sustain the judgment of the tribunal.

Furthermore, the appellate court held that the tribunal erred when it deducted a total of 1, 868 votes that were credited to the APC candidate on the grounds that over-voting occurred in four polling units.

The court said the petitioners failed to provide the necessary documents needed to prove over-voting.

The court noted that Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) machines, and other electoral documents, were merely dumped on the tribunal without any of them demonstrating how the over-voting occurred.

It faulted the tribunal for dismissing the evidence of witnesses that testified for the APC candidate, describing the action as “perverse”, adding that none of the witnesses called by the PDP and its candidate gave valid evidence that the tribunal could have acted on.

“On the whole, I hold that this appeal has merit and succeeds, the majority judgment of the tribunal delivered on October 2 is hereby dismissed,” the court ruled.