Abuja – The Supreme Court on Monday upheld the election of Aminu Tambuwal as duly elected Governor of Sokoto State.
In a judgment read by Justice Uwani Abba-Aji, the justices dismissed the appeal filed by the All Progressives Congress (APC) and its governorship candidate, Ahmad Aliyu for lacking in merit.
NAN reports on Nov. 22, 2019 a five-man panel of the Court of Appeal, presided over by Justice Usaini Murkhtar, dismissed the appeals.
NAN reports that the Sokoto State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal had on Oct. 2, 2019 dismissed the petition against Tambuwal.
But dissatisfied with the tribunal judgment, the APC, through its lead counsel, Dr Alex Iziyon (SAN) had appealed the judgment on three grounds of non-compliance with electoral laws, over voting and other irregularities.
The Appeal Court ruled that the appellant failed to prove his case beyond reasonable doubt, thereby dismissed the case.
In a similar judgement, he Supreme Court on Monday upheld the election of Abdullahi Ganduje as duly elected Governor of Kano State.
The Five-Member panel, dismissed the appeals and cross appeals filed by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its candidate Abba Yusuf.
NAN reports on Nov. 22, the court of appeal in Kaduna reaffirmed Ganduje as the duly elected governor of Kano state.
The appellate court panel led by Tijjani Abubakar upheld the ruling of the Kano governorship election tribunal which ruled in favour of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and Ganduje, its candidate in the March election.
The panel dismissed the petitions filed by the PDP and Yusuf, governorship candidate of the opposition party, on the grounds that the petitions lack merit.
The Independent National Electoral Commissioner (INEC) had declared Ganduje winner of the election, saying he polled 1,033,695 votes while Yusuf, his closest rival, garnered 1,024,713 votes.
Dissatisfied with INEC’s declaration, Yusuf and his party headed to the tribunal where they sought annulment of the election “on the grounds that there were irregularities”.
However, judgment was delivered in favour of the governor.
Reacting to the appellate court ruling on Friday, the PDP and its candidate said they will study the judgment and file an appeal before the apex court.
“We will get the full judgment to know the basis of the judgment before proceeding to the supreme court,” he said.
But Ibrahim Mukhtar, attorney general and commissioner for justice in Kano, said the judiciary upheld justice.
“Today’s judgement shows that the judiciary is working and there is justice in our court,” he said.
