Kogi: Faleke reacts to Supreme Court judgment

James Faleke, who challenged the emergence of Yahaya Bello as Governor of Kogi state, has reacted to the Supreme Court’s verdict, which threw out his case against the election of Kogi State Governor, Mr. Bello.


The seven-man panel headed by Justice Sylvester Ngwata, in a unanimous judgment delivered in Abuja on Tuesday, dismissed the claim of James Faleke that he was the rightful candidate for the position.

Faleke in a statement by his spokesman, Duro Meseko, said that he had no regrets challenging the decision of the Independent National Election Commission, INEC, which upheld the election of Bello as the state governor.

Faleke was the running mate of the late Abubakar Audu, the All Progressives Congress, APC, candidate in the November 21, 2015 in Kogi State.

He stated, “We have heard the judgment handed down by the Supreme Court jurists upholding Yahaya Bello as governor. We shall wait for the full text of the judgment to know why they came to that conclusion.

“But let it be stated here that we have no regrets challenging the declaration of our election as inconclusive by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). What we did was to defend the votes cast for Audu/Faleke by the over 240,000 electorates on November 21, 2015.

“The people voted for us as candidates not the APC because they believe in the kind of leadership we offered to provide for them during our campaigns. It would therefore amount to crass betrayal of the trust of the electorate not to have defended their votes till the end.”