Court Dismisses Bid To Disqualify Ighodalo

The Court of Appeal in Abuja has dismissed an appeal brought by Edo State PDP governorship aspirants, Arthur Esene and Anselm Ojezua, which sought to disqualify the party’s candidate, Asue Ighodalo.

GWG.ng reports that the decision was reached as the people of Edo State plan to elect a new governor on 21st of September 2024.

Esene and Ojezua had filed an appeal with file number CA/ABJ/CV/863/2024, requesting the Court of Appeal to overturn an earlier judgment that technically stopped the original petition. The ruling in question was made by Justice James Omotosho of the Federal High Court in Abuja on April 17, which dismissed their suit for being statute-barred, meaning it was filed after the legal deadline.

Justice Omotosho had also found that the appellants failed to provide evidence supporting their claim that Ighodalo had forged his voter’s card. Furthermore, he ruled that the absence of a voter’s card does not disqualify a candidate under the provisions of the Constitution and the Electoral Act, allowing Ighodalo to remain in the race.

In the lead judgment on Friday, Justice Hamma Barka of the Court of Appeal confirmed the Federal High Court’s decision. He agreed that the suit filed by Ojezua and others had indeed been submitted after the allowed time frame and was therefore statute-barred. The Court of Appeal affirmed that Justice Omotosho’s ruling was correct.

Justice Barka also agreed with the finding of the Federal High Court that, not only did Ojezua and others failed to establish their claim that Ighodalo forged his voter’s card, their suit was bereft of any merit because it was based on a flawed assumption that not possession of a voter’s card constitutes a ground to disqualify a candidate from contesting election.

He found that the appellants failed to appeal the findings of the trial court that Ighodalo actually applied to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) for the transfer of his registration from Lagos State to Edo State and that INEC issued a voter’s card to Ighodalo.

Justice Barka proceeded to strike out the appeal for being without merit and proceeded to award cost of N3million against the appellants and in favour of Ighodalo, PDP and INEC.

Other members of the panel – Justices Usman Musale and Okon Abang – agreed with the lead judgment.

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