Makinde Floors Adelabu at Tribunal

THE governorship election tribunal sitting in Ibadan, on Monday, dismissed the petition filed by the governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Adebayo Adelabu challenging the declaration of Seyi Makinde of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP)as the winner of the March 9 gubernatorial election in the state by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).

The Tribunal led by Justice Sirajo Muhammed ruled that the Petitioners failed to prove allegations of of over-voting, corrupt practices, substantial noncompliance with the electoral act 2010, while most of the petitioners’ witnesses based their evidence on hearsay, not direct eyewitnesses accounts.

Muhammed also pointed to the failure of the petitioners to plead any alternative scores against that released by INEC and prove over-voting which was a statutory basis for cancellation of results, according to the electoral act.

The tribunal also ruled out the allegation of anomalies, wrongful collation of results or unaccounted ballot papers, noting that no law compelled an accredited voter to vote.

Also noting that the petitioner presented 37 polling unit agents out of 1,426 polling units challenged, Muhammed held that 1,389 units were therefore deemed abandoned.

However, the tribunal invalidated the result of unit 003, ward 09, Ido local government because the returning officer produced two different results.

Other members of the three man panel that delivered the six-hour-long judgement were Mussa Bazza and Elizabeth Orji.

Makinde was announced winner of the poll having polled 515,621 votes to defeat his closest challenger,Adelabu who scored 357,982 votes.