The election petition case against the three senators from Kogi State came to the last bus-stop last Wednesday. In a common case of failure of the APC Senators to subject themselves to party primaries before election, two of the senators had their elections nullified and their party barred from the rerun, while Senator Dino Melaye smiled away with the dismissal of the case against him.
By Kingsley Fanwo
THE Court of Appeal, Abuja Division was the cynosure of many political stakeholders from Kogi State last Wednesday, December 2, 2015. It was the day the court gave judgment on all the three appeals on the Senate contests in Kogi State.
All three APC senators who were declared winners of the election by the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC had been dragged to the tribunal on the common ground that the party did not conduct primaries prior to the 2015 general elections as against the grains of the law.
While the case against Senator Dino Melaye, Kogi West was dismissed at the lower tribunal, the duo of Mohammed Ohiare and Abdulrahman Abubakar had suffered defeats at the lower tribunal.
With the prevailing breeze of unease, the December 2 judgments were expected to decide the fate of all three embattled Senators. The election that produced Sen. Abdulrahman (Railway) of Kogi East was finally nullified and another election was ordered by the Appeal Court within 90 days. Remarkably, APC was disqualified from contesting the bye election as its candidate ab initio was improperly nominated. The same judgment was delivered between Sen. Ohiare and Hon. Ogembe of the PDP.
Coming to Kogi West, the tides changed. The breeze around the ocean suddenly turned hot as Melaye was declared to have been the winner of the Kogi West contest, a situation that has puzzled political pundits and judicial record keepers.
The decision of the Court of Appeal to nullify the election of the two other senators elected on the same basis has now raised focus on the judgments.
The Dino escape is, however, not the only one. It is on record that a number of House of Assembly members who won elections on the platform of the APC had their elections nullified by the Election Tribunals in Lokoja. Some of the APC legislators who scaled the Lokoja hurdles are currently facing the heat at the Appellate Tribunal in Abuja over the same issue.
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