The National Assembly Election Petitions Tribunal sitting in Abakaliki, the Ebonyi state capital, has nullified the victory of Hon. Simon Atigwe, member representing Udenu/Igboeze North federal constituency in the House of Representatives.
DAILY GAZETTE recall that after the 2023 general election, the Labour Party candidate, Hon. Dennis Agbo, was declared winner and returned elected by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
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However, candidate of the APC, Dr. Oby Ajih, approached the tribunal seeking nullification of Agbo’s victory on the grounds that her party’s logo (APC) did not appear on Form EC8A.
However, the tribunal dismissed her petition for being vague, generic, nebulous, and lacking in merit.
Dissatisfied with the judgment of the lower court, Ajih approached the appellate court, arguing that the election did not comply with the spirit and letters of the Electoral Act.
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After hearing the matter, the Court of Appeal sitting in Lagos nullified the victory of Hon. Dennis Agbo and ordered a fresh election within 90 days.
Delivering her judgment via Zoom, the court sustained the appeal of Oby Ajih, mandating the Independent National Electoral Commission to conduct a fresh election for all parties involved.
In a judgment that lasted less than 30 minutes, the appellate court agreed that the appeal had merit and set aside the judgment of the tribunal.
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They said that the non-inclusion of the APC logo on Form EC8A, contravened the provisions of the Electoral Act.
On 3rd February, a court-ordered fresh election was held, and Hon. Simon Atigwe of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) won and was declared winner by INEC.
Not satisfied with the outcome, Hon. Dennis Agbo and the Labour Party went to the tribunal with allegations of rigging, falsification of figures, wrong computation, multiple thumb printing, substantial non-compliance with the Electoral Act, among others.
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Delivering her judgment on Wednesday, the three-man tribunal nullified the victory of the PDP candidate, Simon Atigwe, and declared Dennis Agbo of the Labour Party winner of the polls.
DAILY GAZETTE correspondence who was in court reports that the tribunal agreed with the petitioners that there were massive rigging, obvious results swap, as well as mutilation of figures in favour of the PDP Candidate.
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It declared invalid, null and void the 2000 votes added to the PDP candidate and restored the votes of 25th February 2023 of 14,229 for the PDP and 28,870 votes for the LP candidate, Rt Hon Dennis Agbo.
“That Atigwe Simon Chukwuemeka was not duly elected by the valid votes cast”
“That the first petitioner won with 23,221 and PDP came second with 21,863 votes” the court held.
The court ordered that certificate of return issued to Atigwe be withdrawn and issued to Hon. Dennis Agbo.
