Tribunal sacks APC’s Udende, returns Suswam as Benue north east senator

The Benue state national assembly elections petitions tribunal has nullified the election of Emmanuel Udende as senator representing Benue north east district in the national assembly.

Two judges out of the three-member panel of the tribunal led by Ory Zik-Ikeorha declared Gabriel Suswam, candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), winner of the senatorial election held on February 25.

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had declared Udende, candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), as the winner of the election after polling a total of 135,573 votes to defeat Suswam who garnered 112,231 votes. 

Not satisfied with the outcome of the poll, Suswam approached the tribunal on the ground that the election was marred by over-voting, irregularities, alterations and falsification of results. 

In the lead judgment, Zik-Ikeoha declared that the evidence provided by the petitioner’s counsel established that there were cases of over-voting, falsification and mutilation of result sheets as well as malpractices “in five out of the seven LGAs that make up the senatorial district”.

The tribunal held that “the petitioner established that the results from the affected polling units were falsified.” 

The panel cancelled 51,895 votes entered for Udende and also cancelled 21,229 votes recorded for Suswam.

After subtracting the votes, Suswam was left with 90,590 while Udende scored 82,699 votes.

However, in a dissenting judgment, Umar Mohammed, another judge, held that the petitioner failed to prove his case.

Mohammed held that most of the witnesses out of the 19 called by Suswam did not provide relevant evidence to prove the allegations of irregularities.

He dismissed the petition and awarded the cost of N100,000 in favour of each of the respondents against the petitioner.