THE State Kogi State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal, sitting in Abuja, on Monday, May 27, upheld the declaration of Governor Usman Ododo of All Progressives Congress (APC) as winner of the November 11, last year, governorship election by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
The three-member tribuna, headed by Justice Ado Birnin-Kudu, held that the petition by the Social Democratic Party (SDP) and its candidate, Murtala Ajaka, was bereft of substance and accordingly dismissed, having failed to prove the allegations of over-voting and non-compliance with the Electoral Act, 2022.
The tribunal, in the unanimous, decision held that all the witness evidence filed before it were incompetent and full of inconsistencies and agreed with the submissions of the respondents that the allegations of forgery raised in the petition were pre-election matter, which ought to have been raised 14 days after the documents were submitted to INEC.
The case commenced in December last year, while on May 13, this year, the SDP, Ajaka, APC, Ododo and INEC adopted their final written addresses, after which the tribunal reserved judgment in the petition.
