Politico Politico News
Bayelsa State Governorship Election Petitions Tribunal has reserved judgement in the case filed by the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Timipre Sylvia, against the declaration of Governor Douye Diri, as the governor of the state.
The chairman of the tribunal, Justice Adekunle Adeleye, yesterday in Abuja, announced that the judgement would be delivered within the 180 days statutorily allowed by law.
He said all parties in the petition would be communicated as soon as the judgement delivery date is fixed.
At yesterday‘s proceedings, the petitioners, Sylvia and APC, adopted their final written address, praying the tribunal to annul the declaration of Diri as the winner of the election.
Their lead counsel, Dr Onyechi Ikpeazu (SAN), told the tribunal that the Independent National Electoral
Commission, INEC, embarked on wrongful exclusion of results before arriving at the declaration of Diri as winner.
The petitioners‘ lawyer stated that the electoral body did not debunk the allegation of wrongful exclusion of results by not calling the state election result collation officer to testify.
He, therefore, urged the tribunal to objectively decide the petition on the strength of the evidence adduced by the petitioners especially because INEC did not call a single witness to challenge all the allegations.
However, Diri‘s counsel, Chris Uche (SAN), informed the tribunal that the petition by Sylvia is dead on arrival because it is grossly deficient in quantity and quality of evidence.
He said that the petition was baseless, frivolous and vexatious and grossly lacking in merit because the two petitioners did not discharge the burden placed on them by law.
