By Elder Patrick Ndukwo<\/p>\n
Tongues have been wagging, and rightly so, since the Appeal Court judgment
\nof December 31, 2015 declaring the Candidate of the All Progressives Grand
\nAlliance (APGA), Dr. Alex Otti as the duly elected Governor of Abia State
\nin the April 2015 governorship election.<\/p>\n
Besides the obvious reduction of the otherwise hallowed upper echelon of
\nthe Nigerian judiciary to a Tower of Babel, it is fast emerging the
\nabattoir of justice to the extent that it has drawn the public ire of the
\nChief Justice of the Federation.<\/p>\n
It is, therefore, sad to see some commentators, even some lawyers take it
\nupon themselves to also defend the indefensible due to partisan and
\npatronage interests. However, an in-depth analysis of the Abia imbroglio
\nwill clearly show why the miscarriage of justice cannot stand.<\/p>\n
The demographics and Geaography of Abia
\nUnderstanding the demographics and geopolitical structure of Abia State
\nis very imperative to appreciating the stakes, especially as they concern
\nthe two big masquerades in the Abia gubernatorial tussle- Governor Okezie
\nIkpeazu (Ph.D) of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Dr. Alex Otti of
\nthe All Progressives Grand Alliance, APGA.<\/p>\n
Abia State has two major political power blocks, namely, Old Bende and
\nUkwa-Ngwa. The Old Bende comprises eight Local Government Areas (LGAs),
\nwhereas nine LGAs are in Ukwa-Ngwa block. Whereas the Old Bende axis has
\nproduced the Governors of Abia State since the creation of the State, both
\nduring the military and the present democratic dispensation, the Ukwa-Ngwa
\naxis has not tasted power before the election of Governor Ikpeazu, despite
\nhaving more local governments and population.<\/p>\n
From the geopolitical equation also, Abia North Senatorial District
\nproduced the first Governor in the current dispensation, Chief Orji Uzor
\nKalu, who hails from Bende L.G.A (1999-2007 or eight years). Abia Central
\nproduced his successor, Chief T. A. Orji who also did eight years
\n(2007-2015). Orji hails from Umuahia North, also Old Bende block). . Both
\nwere on the PDP platform.<\/p>\n
It was, therefore, not surprising that the PDP naturally shopped for a
\nquality governorship candidate from Abia South Senatorial District in
\n2015, which resonated very well with the people of Ukwa-Ngwa political
\nblock and all Abians with sense of justice and fairness. But, certainly
\nnot so with a few who were so blinded by lust for power that they did not
\nmind sacrificing justice and peaceful coexistence. Dr. Alex Otti, one of
\nthe aspirants under the PDP as the rallying point.
\nHe denounced his indigenship of Arochukwu and rather adopted that of
\nIsiala-Ngwa South, where he claimed his parents had resided for years and
\nwhere he and his siblings were born and raised- all in an attempt to
\nclothe himself with the Ngwa toga to qualify for the PDP nomination.<\/p>\n
But the PDP faithful and Abians were not fooled.\u00a0 PDP zoning was on basis
\nof geopolitical equation (by Senatorial Districts), not ethnicity. Thus,
\nit meant that only the people from the six LGAs of Abia South Senatorial
\nDistrict were qualified to vie. That obviously disqualified Dr. Otti,
\nnotwithstanding his claim to Ngwa indigenship. He was evidently on the
\nwrong side of the Ngwa geopolitical equation.<\/p>\n
And all entreaties by Ukwa-Ngwa clan for him not to tear apart their
\nbrotherly bond, and to ensure that a position they had long craved for did
\nnot elude them, fell on deaf ears.<\/p>\n
He decamped to the APGA in the hope perhaps, that he could change the
\nperception and narrative. As if to add salt to injury, he choose his
\nrunning mate from Ndi Uduma Awoke in Ohafia, next LGA to his own Arochukwu
\nLGA all of the same Bende geopolitical block.<\/p>\n
Equally, Arochukwu and Ohafia LGAs constitute the Arochukwu\/Ohafia Federal
\nConstituency. Dr. Otti and APGA, therefore wanted to foist on Abians a
\nsituation where both the Governor and Deputy Governor come from one
\nFederal Constituency, contrary to PDP philosophy and constitution as well
\nas the spirit and letter of Federal Character as enshrined in the 1999
\nConstitution.\u00a0 What an effrontery!<\/p>\n
It was, therefore, not surprising that he lost woefully as the people of
\nAbia queued behind the PDP and Governor Ikpeazu, being the face of equity
\nand justice.<\/p>\n
Questionable Appeal Panel<\/p>\n
Although the Abia State Governorship Tribunal dismissed Dr. Otti\u2019s
\npetition challenging Governor Ikpeazu\u2019s election, the Appeal Court thought
\notherwise on grounds that have drawn understandable opprobrium across Abia
\nand Nigeria.<\/p>\n
But, for the PDP, it wasn\u2019t surprising because they had cried foul ab
\ninitio over the constitution of the Panel. The Appeal Court of Nigeria has
\n16 Divisions with over 64 Justices; thus, it is the practice not to allow
\nthe panel of a local division of the Court of Appeal to hear appeals
\nemanating from its Jurisdiction. It has also been the universal and
\nage-long practice for members of appeal panels, in election matters to be
\ndrawn from different Divisions of the Court of Appeal. In fact, the
\npractice is that no two justices come from the same division. The logic is
\nsimple: their Lordships are human beings with social relations and it is
\nalways better to avoid familiarity and conspiracy.<\/p>\n
It was, therefore, quite curious to the PDP that apart from Chairman of
\nthe Panel, Hon. Justice Oyebisi Omoleye from Makurdi Division, the
\nremaining four of the five-member Appeal Panel were drawn from the Lagos
\nDivision where Dr. Otti has lived and worked all through his banking
\ncareer. He was also alleged to be a well-known close friend of the
\nPresiding Justice of the Lagos Division of the Court of Appeal, Justice
\nAmina Augie.<\/p>\n
The PDP proactively protested and sent a detailed and strongly-worded
\npetition to the President of the Court of Appeal, Hon. Justice Zainab
\nBulkachuwa, requesting the dissolution and reconstitution of the panel in
\nline with the general practice of drawing justices from different
\ndivisions.<\/p>\n
The Party also petitioned President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria and
\ncopied the petition to the President of the Court of Appeal to each of the
\nfive Justices of the Appeal panel, requesting them to disqualify
\nthemselves since the PDP had expressed lack of confidence in the panel as
\nconstituted.<\/p>\n
Therefore, to the PDP, what eventually played out at Owerri on December
\n31, 2015, the PDP did not only confirm the red flag raised by PDP, but
\nactually appeared to justify its suspicion that the panel was in Abia with
\na mandate to uphold Dr. Otti\u2019s appeal.<\/p>\n
Questionable Witnesses<\/p>\n
The panel anchored its decision on the testimonies of Prosecution Witness
\n(PW)20 and PW19 at the Election Petitions Tribunal. It is bewildering that
\ntheir Lordships had dwelt so much on the credibility of PW20, and argued
\nthat there was no way in the record of proceedings that PW20 (who was the
\nstar witness of the Appellants at the tribunal) had stated that he was a
\nlegal practitioner either in Nigeria or in England and rather found him a
\ncredible character. The panel went ahead to give credence to his report,
\nin his capacity as the State Collation Officer of APGA.<\/p>\n
Notwithstanding that he was stationed at the INEC State headquarters in
\nUmuahia, he was giving\/tendering reports of purported occurrences at the
\nunits, wards and local government areas where he was never present and
\ncould never have been at the same time. The Appeal Panel proceeded to
\nstate that it believed the testimony of a witness that never appeared
\nbefore it, over and above the Tribunal that not only witnessed the
\ncross-examination of the said witness, but saw and assessed his demeanor
\nand disposition before arriving at its informed decision.<\/p>\n
This is a sharp contradiction to Section 84 of Evidence Act and the
\nlandmark cases of Haruna vs Modibo and Orji vs Ugochukwu on documentary
\nhearsay, which the panel failed, neglected or refused to take judicial
\nnotice of, or be so guided.<\/p>\n
PW19 was the INEC official who testified on the Card Reader. She had,
\nincidentally made a written report in May 2015 when the petition was
\nfiled, but tried to corroborate her report with her oral testimony in
\nAugust during trial. The Tribunal as that would amount to amending her
\npleading, which was unacceptable.<\/p>\n
The Appeal Panel also erred in relying on the figure contained in the said
\nreport as the authentic number of accredited voters in arriving at its
\ndecision of over-voting. The panel grossly refused to appreciate that Card
\nReader alone could not contain the accurate number of accredited voters.
\nIn fact, Card Reader is not recognized by the Electoral Act as Section 49
\nof the Act provides for the Voters Register and Section 53(2) specifically
\nstipulates that the people should vote and not to be disenfranchised, as
\nthe panel\u2019s decision to cancel election results in Osisioma, Isiala-Ngwa
\nNorth, and Obingwa (with a total registered voters strength of over
\n200,000) amounted to.<\/p>\n
This is a deprivation of the people\u2019s inalienable right to vote and be
\nvoted for as guaranteed by the 1999 Constitution. More so, when
\nconsidering that such spurious cancelation and re-computation left Dr.
\nOtti of APGA with a higher number of votes that formed the basis of his
\ndeclaration as the winner of the gubernatorial election.<\/p>\n
This is in total contradiction of the spirit and letter of the Electoral
\nAct and similar cases decided by sister appeal panels, which in the worst
\ncase would have been a re-run in those areas where results were canceled.
\nMore so since Alex Otti\u2019s purported votes in the panel\u2019s re-computed
\nfigures upon which he was declared winner was merely 50,000 votes, a far
\ncry from the over 200,000 votes canceled in Governor Ikpeazu\u2019s stronghold.<\/p>\n
The cancelation in Obingwa LGA, for instance, leaves Dr. Okezie Ikpeazu
\nwith no single vote whatsoever in his own LGA, meaning that no one at all
\nvoted for him, including himself. Yet this is the LGA that has always
\nrecorded the highest number of votes in the state since 1999.<\/p>\n
Powers of the State Returning Officer to cancel results<\/p>\n
Another issue that begs the question is the power of the State Returning
\nOfficer to cancel the results of the election in the aforementioned three
\nLGAs in the first place, and his purported reversal of the action! In
\nfact, INEC and Ikpeazu had rightly argued that the Returning Officer acted
\nultra- vires his powers. But the Panel went further to state that it also
\ndidn\u2019t recognize the supplementary election of April 25, 2015 so ordered
\nby the Returning Officer, because by its evil genius mathematical
\ncomputation, Dr. Otti had already won based on the offense or mortal sin
\nas it were committed by the 3 LGAs on April 11, warranting the punitive
\ncancellation of their results.<\/p>\n
Paradoxically, the same Panel, on page 74 of its hogwash, disjointed, and
\nmarathon judgment stated: \u201cIt is ordered that the results of Isiala-Ngwa
\nNorth, Obingwa, and Osisioma Local Government Areas of Abia State be and
\nare hereby cancelled\u2026 The election, return and declaration of the 1st
\nRespondent, Okezie Victor Ikpeazu, as the Governor of Abia State are
\nhereby nullified and set aside.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe 1st Appellant, ALEX OTTI, having scored the majority of lawful\/valid
\nvotes cast at the elections\/supplementary elections of 11th and 25th
\nApril, 2015 respectively, held in Abia State for the occupation of the
\nseat of Governor of Abia State and having satisfied the constitutional
\nrequirement of one quarter of the votes in at least two-thirds of the
\nSeventeen Local Government Areas of Abia State is hereby returned as the
\nduly elected Governor of Abia State\u201d.<\/p>\n
This volte face by the Panel in, first recognizing the April 25
\nsupplementary election as ordered by the Returning Officer, and finally
\nrecognizing 17 local government areas as opposed to 14, having earlier
\ncancelled 3, is manifestly glaring! This exposes the entire untidy
\nexercise.<\/p>\n
Failure of Alex Otti to testify<\/p>\n
It was a gross error and contradictory on the part of the five-man Appeal
\nPanel to decide that the failure of Dr. Alex Otti, the first
\nPetitioner\/Appellant, to testify in his own petition was of no material
\nimportance. In fact, on the contrary, it remains fatal to his case.<\/p>\n
Instructively, an earlier panel of the same Court of Appeal, Owerri
\nDivision, in dismissing the Interlocutory Appeal by Dr. Otti seeking to be
\nallowed to testify out of time had this to say in October 2015: \u201cOn the
\nmerits, this conduct of approbating and reprobating on the same point the
\nAppellants are estopped from insisting on a longer period than the 7 days
\nthey had agreed on, or consented to, for the presentation of their case at
\nthe lower Tribunal, since they had consented to the 7 days to do so. See
\nUDE vs. NWARA (1993) 2 NWLR (part 278)638 at 662 \u2013 663\u2026.
\n\u201cThe Petitioners\/Appellants had, in my view, approached the proceedings at
\nthe lower Tribunal as if they had all the time in the world to prosecute
\ntheir petition in whatever laissez faire manner or that they had the magic
\nof Joshua to arrest the sun or time from moving.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is clear\u2026that delay defeats equity and that equity only aids the
\nvigilant and not the indolent\u2026\u201d<\/p>\n
From the above comments of the erudite justices, it is obvious that an
\nunserious party or candidate who abandons the serious and arduous task of
\nproving the facts of his petition cannot expect victory at the end of the
\nday. In law, a sworn witness deposition does not become evidence until the
\ndeponent has adopted such testimony under oath in the witness box. In this
\ncase, Dr. Otti adduced no evidence to support his petition and for the
\nfive-man Appeal Panel to hold contrary is a grave error in law. Therefore,
\nDr. Otti\u2019s failure to testify at the Election Petitions Tribunal meant
\nthat he had abandoned his petition.<\/p>\n
The Issue of over-voting: The Zamfara State case<\/p>\n
In a similar case of alleged over-voting in the Zamfara State governorship
\nelection the full panel of the Supreme Court unanimously decided on
\nJanuary 8, 2016 that: \u201cThe grouse of the appellants in this issue,
\nbasically, is that there was over-voting and that because of that there
\nwas substantial non-compliance with the Electoral Act.<\/p>\n
\u201cTo prove over-voting, the law is trite that the petitioner must tender
\nthe voters\u2019 register. The Court must also see the statement of result in
\nthe appropriate forms which would show the number of registered accredited
\nvoters and number of actual voters\u201d.<\/p>\n
In delivering the judgment, Justice John Okoro JSC, said: \u201cFrom the
\nfinding above, I agree with the court below that the appellants failed
\nwoefully to prove over-voting in accordance with the principles laid down
\nby law.\u201d<\/p>\n
The Supreme Court equally said that, the appellant must also relate each
\nof the documents to the specific area of the case in respect of which
\ndocuments were tendered.<\/p>\n
In other words, the Supreme Court is emphatic that the allegation or issue
\nof over-voting is Polling Unit-specific and not Ward or LGA-specific as
\nthe five-man Appeal Panel in Owerri grossly misinterpreted and misapplied,
\nculminating in their so called cancellation of votes in Obingwa, Osisioma,
\nand Isiala-Ngwa.<\/p>\n
The import of this is that whereas over-voting as it were may occur in one
\nor two or more polling units in a Ward and similarly ten or more wards in
\na LGA, it will be gross injustice to cancel the votes of the entire Ward
\nor LGA because of an infraction of just about 10 percent or less of the
\ntotal registration area. It will amount to an unwarranted and unmitigated
\npunishment of a larger innocent group, which is what the five-man Appeal
\nPanel has done in the Abia case.<\/p>\n
Moreover, the law provides for a rerun in areas where cancellation is done
\nas a result of over-voting and not a punitive punishment of
\ndisenfranchising, even the voters that participated in the alleged
\nover-voting.<\/p>\n
Juxtaposing the Supreme Court decision in Zamfara\u2019s case with a sister
\nCourt of Appeal Panel in the Taraba case, it is glaringly evident that the
\n5-man Appeal Court of Appeal Panel in Owerri grossly erred in interpreting
\nand applying the law on the issue of over-voting.<\/p>\n
The Supreme Court further stated that: \u201cThe reliance on the evidence one
\nof the witnesses through a document he did not make has not made any
\ndifference\u201d.<\/p>\n
This decision by the Supreme Court is in sharp contrast with that of the
\nfive-man Appeal Panel, which erroneously and laboriously strove to give
\nadmissibility to the evidence of PW 19 in the Abia case.<\/p>\n
Little wonder Abians have trouped out en masse to show their
\ndissatisfaction over what they see as miscarriage of justice. The Appeal
\nPanel\u2019s verdict has equally elicited a lot of reactions, commentaries and
\ndiscourse in many fora, albeit in defense of and solidarity with Dr.
\nOkezie Ikpeazu.<\/p>\n
Governor Ikpeazu\u2019s rising goodwill<\/p>\n
However, the Appeal Court travesty, notwithstanding, political observers
\nhave noticed with keen interest that the enormous show of solidarity
\nironically comes more from the areas and people that had prior to Governor
\nIkpeazu\u2019s election, shown palpable apprehension regarding his ability to
\nperform as a Governor. But with just six months in office, it is entirely
\nnew stories and testimonies for the ebullient and performing Governor.<\/p>\n
With a plethora of groundbreaking achievements, the Governor is the
\ndarling of the Abia people, and Aba in particular ironically, who have
\nnever seen it that good before. From the cement pavement-metal rod
\nbasket\/9 inch thick asphalt road construction technology with modern wide
\ndrains and solid bridges to the construction and major rehabilitation of
\nover 40 roads across the state, the landmark reconstruction and equipping
\nof public primary and secondary institutions as well as the unprecedented
\nfree feeding of primary school pupils starting January 2016, Governor
\nIkpeazu is on lips of the young and old even as hitherto doubting Thomases
\nhave wholeheartedly embraced him.<\/p>\n
Therefore, for Abians, all eyes remain on the Supreme Court for true
\njustice and redress so their joy will not be caught short.
\n\u2013\u2013Elder Ndukwo wrties from Umuahia<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Elder Patrick Ndukwo Tongues have been wagging, and rightly so, since the Appeal Court judgment of December 31, 2015 declaring the Candidate of the All Progressives Grand Alliance (APGA),…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":45565,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_lmt_disableupdate":"","_lmt_disable":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[17],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-45638","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-exclusive"],"yoast_head":"\n