Senate President loses as court declares Machina APC Yobe North candidate

The Federal High Court in Damaturu has knocked the wind out of the sails of Senate President Ahmad Lawan by declaring Alhaji Bashir Machina as the authentic candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) for the Yobe North Senatorial district election next 25th February.

In her almost two hours judgment, Justice Fadima Aminu ordered the APC to immediately send Machina’s name to the Independent Nation Electoral Commission (INEC) as the valid winner of the party’s primary election for the  held on 28th May.

The judge described the primary election that produced Lawan as senatorial candidate as a “phantom and therefore a nullity”.

In the list published by INEC last week, the APC had no name recorded as candidate in the Yobe North Senatorial district as a result of the litigation between both claimants to the ticket.

Lawan was in the pioneer federal parliament of the Fourth Republic in 1999 as a member of the House of Representatives for Bade/Jakusko federal constituency. After two terms, he was elected Senator for Yobe North in 2007, making this term his fourth term in the upper legislative chamber.

While the Senate President was bidding for the APC presidential ticket, which he eventually lost, Machina focused on replacing the long-term federal parliamentarian. He polled 289 delegate votes out of 300 in the initial primary of the party, which INEC supervised. But the party controversially organised another one after claiming that Machina withdrew his candidacy, a position the candidate vehemently denied.