Dino Loses Appeal as Court Orders Fresh Election in 90 Days


The senator representing Kogi West Senatorial District at the National Assembly, Senator Dino Melaye, yesterday suffered a setback as the Court of Appeal dismissed his suit challenging his sack from the National Assembly.  A three man panel of the appellate court in a judgment delivered, upheld the decision of the Kogi State National Assembly Election Petition Tribunal which nullified the election of Melaye as Senator representing Kogi West Senatorial District on account of manifest electoral malpractices.
Melaye had approached the Court of Appeal to set aside the majority judgment of the tribunal which nullified his victory in the February 23 senatorial election and ordered for a fresh election within 90 days.
In the appeal, Melaye claimed that the tribunal erred in law when it reached a decision based on hearsay to nullify his election.
He therefore asked the appellate court to set aside the tribunal’s judgment and upheld his election as Senator representing Kogi West Senatorial District.
However delivering judgment in the appeal, the three-man panel of Justices of the Court of Appeal led by Justice Abubakar Yahaya upheld the decision of the tribunal and ordered the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to conduct a fresh election within 90 days.
In the unanimous judgment delivered by Justice Mohammed Idris, the appellate court held that the election was invalid due to fundamental error by INEC which in the result sheets fixed February 25 as date the senatorial election was conducted rather than February 23 the actual date the election held.
Melaye through his lawyer Dr. Onyechi Ikpeazu (SAN), had urged the Appeal Court to set aside the over-voting decision of the tribunal because it was based on hearsay instead of polling units agents’ result.
The counsel drew the attention of the Justices to the fact that only three witnesses were called, adding that the evidence of the three witnesses based on hearsay could not justify the cancellation of the senatorial election.
Ikpeazu further submitted that mutilation of result sheet was untenable because the final result of senatorial election was endorsed by agents of the candidates and the parties, and that the petitioners failed to establish that the alleged mutilated result substantially affected the final result collation.
 Similarly, the other appellants PDP and INEC had urged the court to set aside the majority judgment on the grounds that they were denied fair hearing and were not allowed to evaluate evidence adduced during the hearing.
According to the PDP, the tribunal erred in law when it based its claim of over voting on the number of collected permanent voter cards rather than voter register as required by law.

For more details, get This Day newspaper.

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