Justice Emeka Nwite of the Federal High Court, Abuja has nullified nomination of Governor Isiaka Oyetola and his Deputy, Benedict Alabi, as candidates of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the last Osun 2022 governorship election.
Justice Emeka nullified the nominations of Oyetola and his deputy in a judgment delivered in the suit filed by the PDP, indicating that they were never candidates in the just concluded governorship election.
The suit marked: FHC/ABJ/CS/468/2022, had Former Acting Chairman of the APC and Governor of Yobe State, Mai Mala Buni and four others as defendants. Justice Nwite in his judgement held that the nomination of Oyetola and his deputy, was against the law and unconstitutional because their names were submitted to INEC, in violation to the provisions of Section 183 of the Constitution and Section 82(3) of the Electoral Act 2022 by Buni.
Counsel to the PDP, Mr. Kehinde Ogunwumiju, SAN, had in the suit dated April 7, urged the court to void the nomination of Governor Oyetola and his deputy as the duly nominated candidates of the APC on the grounds that the action of Buni breached the law. However, Mr. Kunle Adegoke, SAN, Oyetola’s lawyer stood to against the submission, urged the court to dismiss the suit for being incompetent and lacking in merit.
Mr. Kunle Adegoke, SAN, Oyetola’s lawyer, said in court that Plaintiff did not have the locus to commence the legal action against the defendants, since it was not a member of the APC and more so, the issue of nomination was an internal matter of political parties. He further, argued that the suit was statute-barred, hence the court should dismiss it.
Justice Nwite while delivering his judgement agreed with the submissions of the Plaintiff’s counsel and declared the nomination of Oyetola and Alabi by the APC as null and void.
The court also held that Governor Buni acted in contravention of the provision of Section 183 of the Constitution when he held dual executive positions as the Governor of Yobe State and the Chairman of the National Caretaker Committee of APC had led to the nullification of Governor Oyetola and Alabi nomination to INEC by law.
It could be remembered that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), had declared the candidate of the PDP, Senator Ademola Adeleke, winner of the July 16 governorship election, having scored the highest number of votes cast at the polls.
