Kogi National Assembly members Challenges INEC Over Exclusion from Re-run

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three members of the National Assembly from Kogi State: Senator Abdulrahman Abubakar, Senator Mohammed Abdulsalami Ohiare and Abdullahi Bello, have taken the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to court for allegedly excluding them from a re-run election.

Senator Abubakar, who is from Kogi-East Senatorial District, Senator Ohiare who is from Kogi Central Senatorial District, and Abdullahi Bello who represents Okene-Ogori Magongo Federal Constituency are contending in their separate suits filed Thursday at the Federal High Court sitting in Abuja against INEC that the Court of Appeal which had entertained their election cases did not exclude them from the re-run elections.

Counsel to the lawmakers, Jibrin Samuel Okutepa, stated in a letter protesting INEC’s position that INEC is acting outside its powers. “We wish to draw your attention, Mr Chairman, to the fact that in the judgments of the Court of Appeal, there was nowhere an order was made barring any of our clients from participating in the fresh elections ordered”. The electoral commission had stated in a public notice it issued last Monday indicating that conduct of elections as ordered by the Court of Appeal would take place in Kogi on February 20, but that Senators Abdulrahman Abubakar and Mohammed Abdulsalami Ohiare and Abdullahi Bello and their parties (being the All Progressives Congress APC) were excluded.

Senator Abubakar’s election had earlier been nullified by the electoral tribunal on the grounds that it did not see the result of the primary election of the person he substituted, even as he argued that the substitution was duly done and that INEC accepted him. The tribunal asked that his certificate be withdrawn; but upon appeal, the Appeal Court ordered a rerun within 90 days. While waiting for the rerun, he returned to the Court of Appeal in light of Supreme Court judgment in Taraba and other zones, only for INEC to say that those whose cases were in court could not participate in the rerun.

Senator Ohiare, on his part said the election tribunal ruled that although the primary election which produced him was inconclusive because voting did not involve one of the five local government areas that make up his Kogi Central Senatorial Zone, he won the election technically. But that his opponent went to the Court of Appeal which ordered a fresh election, only for INEC to raise issue of qualification to exclude him and his party from the rerun.

Abdullahi Bello’s predicament also centres on primary election, as his election was nullified by the tribunal because the primary election result sheet indicating his election did not contain the venue of the election. The case proceeded to the Court of Appeal which ordered a fresh election. But Bello returned to the court, following the decision of the Supreme Court of January 8 in the Mahmud Aliyu Shinkafi Vs Abdulazeez Abubakar Yari case.

Credit: Daily Trust

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