Supreme court upholds election of Osun governor

The supreme court has upheld the victory of Gboyega Oyetola, candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the Osun governorship election.

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had declared Oyetola winner of the election after a rerun in September 2018.

Dissatisfied with INEC’s declaration, Ademola Adeleke, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, filed a petition at the tribunal and he was declared winner of the election but Oyetola appealed the verdict of the tribunal.

In May, the appeal court gave judgement in favour of the APC candidate. The court had set aside the entire proceedings of the tribunal, saying the panel was not well constituted.

Delivering the majority judgement on Friday, Bode Rhodes-Vivour, a judge, held that the appeal court was right to set aside the entire proceedings of the tribunal.

Rhodes-Vivour said the failure of J. Obiora, a member of tribunal, to attend proceedings on February 6 rendered the judgement a “nullity.”

The judge also said the certified true copy (CTC) was not signed by Obiora.

“It affected the proceedings. The appeal is dismissed,” he said.

Giving the minority judgement, Kumai Akaas, a member of the apex court’s panel, said a judge does not have to sign a certified true copy (CTC) of a judgement before it is valid.

“There is a precedence. The judge does not need to sign CTC of the judgement,” he said.

Five of the seven judges on the apex court panel agreed with the judgement which favoured Oyetola while two disagreed.