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The Court of Appeal sitting at Ringroad, Ibadan, on Monday upheld the election of Prince Dapo Abiodun of the All Progressive Congress(APC) as the duly elected governor of Ogun State.
The four-man panel led by Justice Abubakar Yahaya in its judgement upheld the September 14, 2019 ruling of the Ogun State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal sitting in Abeokuta in its entirety and dismissed Adekunle Akinlade’s appeal as lacking in merit.
The panel had resolved all the 10 issues raised by Akinlade and his party, Allied Peoples Movement(APM) to express his dissatisfaction at the ruling of the tribunal in favour of the APC candidate.
The Appellate Court dismissed the appeal, saying Abiodun was duly elected by majority of votes cast during the March 9 governorship election in Ogun state.
Recall that the APM governorahip governorship candidate, Akinlade, had appealed the ruling of the Ogun state Governorship Election Petition Tribunal which upheld the victory Governor Abiodun, the APC candidate.
The appeal was filed on October 18 against INEC, Abiodun and APC on the allegation that Abiodun’s victory was fraudulent, arguing that the information on his nomination form was wrong and there were series of irregularities recorded during the election.
Akinlade’s counsel, Sebastine Hon had prayed the court to grant all the prayers contained in the appeal of his client and dismiss the defence of all the respondents.
Abiodun’s counsel, Prof. Taiwo Osipitan, in his argument before the court had urged the panel to uphold the judgement of the tribunal and dismiss the appeal on the ground that it lacks merit.