The Supreme Court has upheld the decision of the Independent National Electoral Commission removing Otukpa Constituency seat from the Benue state House of Assembly.

The court's decision finally laid to rest the move by a former National Chairman of the Peoples Democratic Party, Chief Audu Ogbeh, who is now a leader in the All Progressives Congress, and some other leaders of his Otukpo community in Benue State, to get the constituency restored.

Although the community lost the case on technical grounds, the Supreme Court advised INEC not to ignore the people's complaint.

The court nullified the judgments of the two lower courts which had ordered the Independent National Electoral Commission to restore the constituency.

Justice Suleiaman Galadima, who delivered the lead judgment of the five-man panel, struck out the suit and upheld the appeal filed by the INEC on the grounds that the plaintiffs failed to institute the suit within three months of the said excision and suppression of the constituency in 1996 but waited for 15 years to complain about the alleged wrong.

Otukpa Constituency was said to have elected its first representative to the state house of assembly in 1979 and subsequently elected two others to occupy the seat until the constituency was “excised and suppressed” in 1996.

The number of seats in the Benue State House of Assembly would have increased from 29 to 30 if the suit had been successful at the apex court.

The Supreme Court upheld INEC’s argument that the suit instituted on October 25, 2011, about 15 years after the constituency had been suppressed had been caught by statute of limitation.

Justice Suleiman Galadima, who read the lead judgment, held that both the Makurdi Divisions of the Federal High Court and the Court of Appeal were wrong to have assumed jurisdiction in the suit.

According to him, by virtue of section 2(a) of the Public Officer’s Protection Act such action against public officers should have been filed within three months when the alleged wrong was done.

source:http://www.thisdaylive.com/articles/sc-upholds-cancellation-of-benue-assembly-seat/213958/

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What a waste of time and funds