Alleged Forgery: Court Dismisses PDP’s Suit Against Gombe, Yahaya
Justice Binta Nyako of the Federal High Court sitting in Abuja, has dismissed a suit seeking to nullify the emergence of Governor Mohammed Inuwa Yahaya of Gombe State, as candidate of the All Progressives Congress in the forthcoming general elections.
In her ruling on Tuesday, Justice Nyako upheld the defendants’ preliminary objection and struck out the suit for being incompetent.
However, the court declined request for punitive cost to be awarded against the plaintiffs for abusing the judicial process.
The ruling was on a case of allegation that Governor Yahaya submitted forged documents to the Independent National Electoral Commission, to aid his qualification.
The suit marked FHC/ABJ/CS/1301/2022, was filed by the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, and two of its chieftains in the state, Muhammed Jibrin Barde and Hon. Timothy Danlele.
Defendants in the suit were the INEC, the All Progressives Congress, and Governor Yahaya.
By the suit, the plaintiffs, through their lawyer, Johnson Usman, SAN, alleged that the governor lied on oath in documents he submitted to the INEC.
The plaintiffs also claimed that whereas the governor, in the Form CF001 he submitted to INEC in aid of his qualification to contest the 2019 governorship election, stated that he worked with A.Y.U & Co Ltd from1980-1990, however, in the Form EC-9 he submitted to seek re-election, he averred that he worked at the same company from 1985 to 2003.
It was their argument that the 3rd defendant was inconsistent in the depositions he made on oath and therefore ought to be disqualified from participating in the governorship election slated for March 11.
“That the 3rd defendant having submitted forged documents to the 1st defendant in his INEC form EC-9 in 2022 is not qualified to contest the governorship election of Gombe state”, the plaintiffs contended, adding that his action was in breach of both the 1999 Constitution, as amended, and the Electoral Act, 2022.
Among other reliefs, the Plaintiffs prayed the court to declare that in view of the provisions of Sections 177(d) and 182 (I) (j) of the 1999 Constitution, as amended, as well as Section 84(3) and (13) of the Electoral Act, the governor, is not qualified to participate in the election, the plaintiffs further urged the court to compel INEC to expunge his name from the list of bonafide candidates for the impending governorship contest.
More so, they asked the court to restrain the 3rd defendant from parading himself as the governorship candidate of the APC in the state.
However, both the APC and governor Yahaya, through their lawyer, Mr. Marshall Abubakar, challenged the competence of the suit, even as they persuaded the court to dismiss it for want of jurisdiction.
They posited that PDP and its members did not have the legal right to file an action to challenge the nomination of candidate by another political party.
The defendants submitted that only members of a party and its aspirants can challenge the outcome of a primary election or the nomination of a candidate.
