APC loses in Court to disqualify PDP candidate, Ighodalo in Edo guber poll

By Jude Opara

An eleventh-hour attempt by the All Progressives Congress, (APC) to get the governorship candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Asue Ighodalo disqualified from the Edo State Governorship election has been dismissed.
The APC suit filed at the Federal High Court in Abuja seeking to oust Ighodalo from the gubernatorial race was dismissed yesterday by Justice Peter Lifu.
The Judge agreed with Ighodalo’s lawyer, Chief Akinlolu Kehinde that the suit was frivolous, baseless, and unwarranted and was thrown out.
In his judgment in the suit, Justice Lifu rejected the prayer of the APC to use another judgment of the same court that had queried the validity of the primary election that produced Ighodalo to kick him out of the race.
In a suit marked THC/ABJ/CS/165/2024, Justice Inyang Ekwo had on July 4 held that PDP was wrong in excluding 378 delegates from its February 22 primary election that produced Ighodalo.
Although Justice Ekwo did not categorically declare the primary election invalid, the APC cashing in on Ekwo’s finding, filed a fresh suit to disqualify Ighodalo on the strength of the alleged unlawful exclusion.
However, Justice Lifu upheld the submission of the senior lawyer that the Federal High Court cannot sit as an appellate Court in its own judgment.
The Judge also agreed that APC was a busybody and meddlesome interloper by dabbing into the internal affairs of PDP.
Besides, Justice Lifu also upheld the argument of Kehinde SAN that the High Court judgment being used to press for Ighodalo’s disqualification had since been voided and set aside by the Court of Appeal in Abuja.
The Judge subsequently dismissed the APC’s disqualification request on the ground that it lacked merit and substance.
The APC had sued the Independent National Electoral Commission INEC, Asue Ighodalo and PDP as 1st to 3rd defendants respectively.