Supreme court upholds Inuwa Yahaya’s victory as Gombe governor

The supreme court has affirmed Inuwa Yahaya’s re-election as the governor of Gombe state.

A five-member panel of the court led by Kudirat Kekere-Ekun, held that the appeal by Jibrin Barde, candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), lacks merit.

Affirming the verdict of the court of appeal which upheld Yahaya’s victory, Kekere-Ekun held that the concurrent findings were not shown to be perverse enough to warrant being set aside.

Yahaya was declared winner of the March 18 governorship election after he scored 342,821 votes to defeat his closest rival, Barde who polled 233,131 votes.

Displeased, the PDP and its candidate filed a petition claiming that Yahaya, who contested on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC), was not re-elected by a majority of lawful votes.

The opposition party alleged cases of ballot box stuffing and thumbprinting done by Yahaya’s supporters in nine of the state’s 11 LGAs.

The Gombe state governorship election petition tribunal dismissed the suit filed by the party and Barde.

Not satisfied with the tribunal’s verdict, Barde and PDP approached the appeal court.

The appeal court equally dismissed the appeal filed by the PDP governorship candidate.