The Court of Appeal in Abuja on Friday, overturned the August 17, 2020 verdict of the Bayelsa State governorship election petitions tribunal, which had sacked Governor Duoye Diri from office and ordered a fresh election conducted within 3 months.
A five man panel of the court of appeal led by justice Adezila Mshelia set aside the tribunals verdict and affirmed Diri’s election in it’s judgement delivered on Friday.
The three man election petition tribunal sitting in Abuja had in a split decision of two to one, nullified the November 16, 2019 Bayelsa State governorship election as a result of the unlawful exclusion of the Advanced Nigeria Democratic Party ANDP and it’s candidate, King George from the exercise.
Dissatisfied with the judgement, Diri, his party, the People’s Democratic Party PDP and the Independent National Electoral Commission INEC had filed separate appeals against it.
The court of appeal upheld the appeals on Friday by holding that ANDP wasn’t unlawfully excluded from the election.
The appellate court held that there was enough evidence to show that the case of the ANDP was statute barred, having not filed it’s petition within 14 days as stipulated by law.
Ogbunya, in the judgement, agreed with Diri, the appellant, that the case of the ANDP which ought to be filled within 14 days was filed five months after the cause of the event.
On another grounds of appeal, justice Ogbunya also agreed with the appellant that INEC was right in exchanging the ANDP from the November 16 Governorship poll.
This was on grounds of disqualification of the ANDP’s deputy Governorship candidate, who was said to be under age at the time of the election.
Justice Ogbunya held that on the whole, Diri’s case had merit and he subsequently affirmed his election as governor of Bayelsa.
He further set aside the majority judgement of the tribunal that nullified the November 16 governorship poll and ordered fresh election.
