The court of appeal in Abuja has affirmed the verdict of the Kano state governorship election petition tribunal.
The tribunal had sacked Abba Yusuf, candidate of the New Nigeria Peoples Party (NNPP), as governor of the state.
In a judgment delivered on Friday, a three-member panel of the appellate court held that the NNPP breached the constitution by sponsoring Yusuf who was not a member of the party.
The court held that Yusuf's name was not in any of the membership registers of the NNPP tendered before the tribunal — a contravention of section 177(c) of the 1999 Constitution.
"A person must be a member of a political party before he can be sponsored for an election," U. Adumeh, the lead judge, held.
"Sponsorship without membership is like putting something on nothing."
THE TRIBUNAL'S VERDICT
In September, the tribunal nullified the victory of Yusuf in the governorship election.
The tribunal also affirmed Nasiru Gawuna of the All Progressives Congress (APC) as the duly elected governor of Kano..
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had
declared Yusuf as the winner of the election after he polled 1,019,602 votes to
defeat his closest rival, Gawuna, who scored 890,705 votes.
During the proceedings, the tribunal deducted 165,663 votes
from what was recorded for Yusuf on the grounds that the ballot papers
(165,663) were not stamped, signed and dated as required by law.
Yusuf was left with 853,939 votes after the deduction.
The court declared the 165,663 votes recorded from the
affected ballot papers invalid while ordering INEC to issue a certificate of
return to the APC candidate.
Displeased with the verdict of the tribunal, Yusuf headed
for the appellate court.
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The appellate court is confused. If Yusuf was not a candidate of NNPP, let the challenger come from NNPP not from another party, not even from the court. How come the court in this current dispensation of delivering judgement on election petition has assumed the position of political parties? The tribunal meddled in the affairs of NNPP and so is the Appeal court. It is not the place of the court to begin to determine membership unless of course a member of the party has come for such determination. The courts in Nigeria are just funny institutions. They are just funny.
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