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Akineande Soji-Ojo
The Court of Appeal sitting in Lagos has upheld the judgement of the State and National Assembly Elections Petition Tribunal, which validated the victory of Sen. Sharafadeen Alli as the duly elected Senator for Oyo South Senatorial District.
A statement made available to newsmen on Saturday by Alli’s Special Adviser on Media, Akeem Abas, said the Senator won the separate appeals filed by Chief Joseph Tegbe of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Funmilola Gbogbolomo of New Nigeria Peoples Party(NNPP).
The court dismissed Tegbe’s appeal for lacking in merit, thereby affirming the judgement of the tribunal.
In Gbogbolomo’s appeal, the court premised the entire judgement on the sole issue distilled by the the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), the first respondent in the suit.
The court agreed with the tribunal and defendants that the case was a pre-election matter, while also agreeing that the appellant did not prove non-compliance.
The judges unanimously dismissed the appeal and awarded cost against the appellant.
Tegbe and Gbogbolomo had appealed the judgements of the tribunal which dismissed their separate petitions against Alli’s victory in the February 25 National Assembly election in Oyo South.
The tribunal had in its judgement said that the evidences presented before it by Tegbe and PDP were not credible and difficult to believe.
It said that Tegbe had failed to present cogent, reliable, and compelling evidence, sufficient to affect the results of theelwction as declared by INEC.
The court dismissed the petition on the grounds that the petition was incompetent.
While delivering judgement in the NNPP case, the tribunal held that the petition was incompetent as the ground upon which it was premised related to a pre-election matter which ought not to be brought before the tribunal.
The tribunal, in the NNPP’s petition, held that having regards to the pleadings and evidence before the court, the petitioners also failed to rebut the presumption of regularity in the conduct of the election by INEC.
