Abia gov’ship election: S’court reserves judgment May 12

The Supreme Court on Wednesday reserved its judgment for May 12 on the appeals filed by Dr. Samson Ogah challenging the decision of the Court of Appeal Abuja Division that set aside the ruling of the federal high court and affirmed the election of Governor Okezie Ikpeazu.

Ogah who is contending that governor Ikpeazu gave false information about his tax clearance certificate with which he contested the primary election.

Therefore he (Ogah) who came second at the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) primary was the rightful candidate that won the 2015 election.

Dissatisfied with Court of Appeal decision which upturned his initial victory at the trial court and he had lodged two separate appeals at the Supreme court.

Gov Ikpeazu also filed a cross appeal. A panel of the Supreme court justices headed by the Acting chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Samuel Onnoghen heard the appeals yesterday after they were consolidated.

At the hearing, Samson Ogah urged the court to set aside the judgement of the court of appeal which last year upheld the nomination of Ikpeazu.

Counsel to the appellant Alex Iziyon (SAN) in his argument, submitted vehemently that the case of his client was that Ikpeazu was not qualified to have contested the 2015 Abia governorship election on the platform of PDP on the grounds that he supplied false information in the document used to secure clearance for the election.

The counsel maintained that the Court of Appeal erred in law when it based its judgment in favour of the governor on the effect that Ogah founded his case on perjury against the defendant.

Iziyon insisted that his client never raised any criminal matter against Ikpeazu but only claimed that the respondent submitted false information in his form cf001 which by provision of section 31 of the electoral Act 2010 he was not eligible to stand for election.

Iziyon further argued that the federal high court which removed Ikpeazu from office found that he had supplied false information in respect of his tax papers that were dated Saturday which is a nonworking day.

Iziyon therefore, urged the court to set aside the decision of the court of appeal and uphold the judgment of the federal high court which found Ikpeazu culpable of supplying false information in his document.

In his objection to the appeal, Ikpeazu represented by Wole Olanipekun (SAN) urged the apex court to dismiss the appeal for lacking in merit.

Olanipekun argued that the trial court miscarried justice in its judgment because the PDP guidelines and its constitution which would have aided the court to arrive at a just conclusion were not before the court hence the trial judge based his judgment on extraneous considerations.

Specifically Olanipekun said that the trial court went out of its way when it assumed that Ikpeazu did not pay tax because he was a civil servant.

The counsel also said that it was wrong of the trial court to have persecuted and crucified his client for the office of perjury for a public servants whose tax was deducted from source and confirmed by the Abia tax officers in their affidavit evidence.

Olanipekun maintained that even if there were inconsistencies in the form CF001 of his client, the inconsistencies cannot be used to disqualify Ikpeazu because the provisions of section 31 of the electoral Act cannot override the provisions of Section 177 and 182 of the 1999 constitution which both deal with qualification to stand for election.

He therefore urged the apex court to uphold the findings of the court of appeal which set aside the judgment of the trial court on account of miscarriage of justice and having being based on a criminal matter that was not proved behind reasonable doubt.

The Independent National Electoral Commission represented by Alhassan Umar also urged the dismissal of the appeal to allow the judgment of the appeal court in the matter to stand.