By Vivian Okejeme, Abuja
The Court of Appeal sitting in Abuja, Monday, dismissed the petition by the All Progressives Congress (APC) and its governorship candidate, Senator Aisha Dahiru Binani praying to sack Umar Ahmadu Fintiri as the duly elected governor of Adamawa State.
The Adamawa State Governorship Electoral Petitions Tribunal had, in October, dismissed the petition filed by Binani against Fintiri’s election.
Sequel to that, Binani headed to appeal court for redress.
In the appeal court judgement, justice Tunde Oyebanji Awotoye held that the Fintiri of the Peoples Democratic Party PDP was lawfully declared winner of the poll by the Adamawa State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal.
Specifically, the court held that Binani and APC failed to call polling agents who participated in the conduct of the election as witnesses but unfortunately called Campaign Coordinators who were not at the election venue.
Justice Awotoye said that the three witnesses called to establish malpractices in 27 local government areas who were campaign coordinators are mere hearsay witnesses having not been party agents.
It further held that it is against the law to attach probate values to the testimony of the campaign coordinators since such is worthless in the face of the law.
The judgement insisted that the brief of argument filed by Binani and APC was in contravention of the law, hence, incompetent and deserved to be ignored.
Also, that the records of appeal transmitted to the Court of Appeal by Binani and APC were not complete and in law not incompetent for the court to make any finding.
Consequently, the court declared as illegal act, the declaration of Binani and APC as winners of the election adding that the only authority to make declaration is the Returning Officer.
It also said that it was wrong for Binani to be taking Panadol for the headache of the Resident Electoral Commissioner REC who opted to take laws into his own hand.
“In the eyes of the law, the Resident Electoral Commissioner is on his own. He should be allowed to take responsibility for his illegal and unlawful act”
The unanimous judgment dismissed the appeal in its entirety and award a cost of N1M to be paid to Fintiri and PDP by Binani and APC.
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