The Supreme Court has ruled in favour of the Kano State Governor, Mallam Abba Yusuf, who had challenged the nullification of his election by the Court of Appeal, which has given judgement in favour of the candidate of the All Progressives Congress, Alhaji Nasiru Gawuna.
Justice John Okoro, who read the lead judgement on Friday, said that the suit was predicated on alleged forgery of membership card of the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPC) by Yusuf, and votes manipulation by the Indepedent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in favour of the governor.
Justice Okoro said that one of the main issues is whether the lower court was right to have cancelled 165,616 votes that were ascribed to Yusuf; while another is whether the lower court was correct in assuming jurisdiction on the issue of Yusuf’s membership of the NNPP.
Justice Okoro said: “I have found that the decision of the tribunal to deduct 165,616 votes from the Governor’s results was based on provisions of the Electoral Act 2022″. He said that the electoral provision does not regulate actions at the polling units.
He also asked: “What is the effect of a ballot paper not having the marks by the electoral commission?”, adding, “a ballot paper that does not bear INEC mark is not invalid by all purposess”.
He said that the law requires that it must be proven that a ballot paper was not the ones deployed for the conduct of the election.
“There is no proof that the said ballot papers were not the one used at the election. Thus the decision of the Court of Appeal affirming the decision of the tribunal ought to be set aside”, Justice Okoro ruled.
“Accordingly, all the ballot papers are restored to Governor Yusuf”, Justice Okoro said.
On the issue of Yusuf’s membership of the NNPP, Justice Okoro said that the tribunal never held that Yusuf was not qualified to vie for election as erroneously held by the Court of Appeal.
“The issue of nomination is exclusively the internal affairs of a political party. Therefore, it is not justiceable”, he ruled.
Other members of the Supreme Court panel concurred with the lead judgement.
