Imo Gubernatorial Judgment: Painful but Legally Correct Verdict


https://www.thisdaylive.com/index.php/2020/01/16/imo-gubernatorial-judgment-painful-but-legally-correct-verdict/

January 16, 2020 12:13 am

Kenneth Ikonne, a legal practitioner, posits that Governor Emeka Ihedioha’s legal team made a serious mistake by not filing pivotal cross petition challenging the integrity of the suspect polling units results upon which Senator Hope Uzodinma was relying, and in the absence of a cross petition, the Supreme Court was right to rely on the Electoral Act and Evidence Act in favour of the said results, to reckon with them and add them up to the final result, which upturned Ihedioha’s position and gave victory to Uzodinma.


It is indeed a perplexing paradox: Hope Uzodinma may not have won the 2019 Imo State gubernatorial election, yet the Supreme Court, on the facts, was right in declaring him the winner of that election in law. The error was not the Supreme Court’s, but that of Governor Emeka Ihedioha’s legal team; and it was a crucially fatal error.

What happened was this: during the governorship election in Imo State, apparently concocted results, perhaps, not having any basis whatsoever in reality, but signed by Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) presiding officers, were turned in from more than 350 polling units, giving Hope Uzodinma of the APC an incredibly unassailable lead. When those results were transmitted to the wards collation centres, the collation officers, who had no power in law to cancel or reject them, rejected the said polling units results, and refused to collate them, thereby effectively excluding them from the total tally of the governorship result that was eventually declared by the Returning Officer.


In the aftermath of the said exclusion, the INEC declared Governor Ihedioha the winner of the election.


The exclusion of the results of those polling units was the fulcrum of the petition presented at the Tribunal by Hope Uzodinma. Ever since David Mark V. Abubakar Usman, and Doma V INEC, the law has been settled that neither collation officers nor a returning officer, has the power in law to exclude a polling unit result duly signed by the presiding officer at the polling unit; only the election tribunal possesses the power to cancel or exclude such a result.


So, at the point of its presentation, Senator Uzodinma’s petition was potentially viable, in spite of the apparent dubiousness of the polling units results on which it was anchored, there being a rebuttable presumption of regularity and correctness, by virtue of both the Electoral Act and Evidence Act, enuring in favour of any result declared by a presiding officer.


The backbreaking and fatal error made by Ihedioha’s legal team was in not filing a cross petition fiercely challenging the integrity of the suspect polling units results upon which Uzodinma was relying, and praying the election tribunal to formally nullify the said results.


Without a cross petition, none of the grounds under section 138 (1) of the Electoral Act for questioning the elections conducted in those polling units in which Uzodinma “won” could have been competently raised by Governor Ihedioha in his defence to Uzodinma’s petition. This was the ratio decidendi of the old Court of Appeal decision in Idris V. A.N.P.P.(2008)8 NWLR(PT.1088) Page 1. In the recent Court of Appeal decision in Atiku Abubakar V. Buhari, the Court of Appeal again invoked the principle in dismissing Buhari’s contention that Atiku Abubakar was born in Cameroun to parents who originally were Camerounians, and thus disqualified from contesting the election. Dismissing the contention, the Court of Appeal held that the issue was incompetent, since Buhari did not file a cross petition.


Ihedioha indeed did set up facts in his reply to the petition rehashing the serial infractions that led to the exclusion of the results of the said 300 plus polling units. But that was legally not enough, in the absence of a cross petition. Besides, such renditions by a respondent in a mere Reply or Statement of Defence are clearly incompetent. The reason for the incompetence was made clear by the Court of Appeal in National Judicial Council & Ors V. Hon. Justice Jubril Babajide Aladejana & Ors (2014) LPELR – 2413 (CA) Page 31, paras C – F, at ratio 3 thus –


“The law is that it is a plaintiff who by his statement of claim primarily nominates issues to be tried in a suit and which he relies on to have the judgment of the court. For a defendant, it is only necessary to resist the plaintiff’s claim on the facts pleaded. It is not for a defendant to set up facts which would convey that it is not just setting up a defence but setting up a new case of his own. He can only do so by way of a counter claim.


Shorn of the legalese, what the above authority is simply saying is that since the issue nominated for trial by Hope Uzodinma was the unlawfulness or otherwise of the exclusion of the results of the 300 plus polling units by the ward collation officers, Ihedioha’s defence was therefore necessarily restricted by law to showing that those who excluded the results had the power in law to exclude them.


Without a cross petition praying for the nullification of those results, the law forbade Governor Ihedioha as respondent from raising the issue of the alleged serial corrupt practices and irregularities marring the said results, in a mere statement of defence; that was a new issue not nominated by Uzodinma as petitioner. Ihedioha, being a Respondent, could only have competently raised them via a cross petition, being a new issue not nominated by Uzodinma, the petitioner.

Tragically, Ihedioha’s legal team forgot to include the pivotal cross petition. And in the absence of a cross petition, the Supreme Court was right in law, painfully though it may seem, to rely on the presumption of regularity and correctness enshrined by both the Electoral Act and Evidence Act in favour of the said results, and to reckon with them and add them up to the final result, since Ihedioha’s legal team had woefully failed to effectively attack the results and rebut that presumption.

For the Supreme Court, this was the legally correct conclusion to come to, having found that INEC had no power in law to exclude polling units results duly affirmed by the various polling units presiding officers.

https://www.thisdaylive.com/index.php/2020/01/16/imo-gubernatorial-judgment-painful-but-legally-correct-verdict/

The law is an ass. Politicians are holes in the law.

@ least dem go address him as Ex 8 months spelling bee gov

Still doesn't remove the fact that the Supreme court is not only biased but inconsistent with it's rulings in recent history. How can the Supreme court be consistent when you have a man as incompetent as Tanko at the helm of its affairs?

I talk am ooo....the argument was never about the vote, but who has rights to cancel votes....And this loophole is very bad.

I hope they rely on Electoral and evidence act in Kano too.

olaric:
Still doesn't remove the fact that the Supreme court is not only biased but inconsistent with it's rulings in recent history. How can the Supreme court be consistent when you have a man as incompetent as Tanko at the helm of its affairs?

You are not a cerebral man
This judgment is not about the CJN person personality. This is purely smart and brilliant work the legal team of APC did to beat off PDP Ihedioha. This same cross petition was used by the Supreme Court to jettison Buhari team argument That Atiku was not a true Nigerian. This same loop which Your PDP legal team couldn’t cover cost them IMO state. The Supreme Court is great. PDP legal team is just not Brilliant as the APC legal team. Period!!!

Hope Should go and pay homage to Tinubu the master Planner with the greatest legal team in Nigeria

WiLdFLame:

You are not a cerebral man
This judgment is not about the CJN person personality. This is purely smart and brilliant work the legal team of APC did to beat off PDP Ihedioha. This same cross petition was used by the Supreme Court to jettison Buhari team argument That Atiku was not a true Nigeria. This same loop which Your PDP legal team couldn’t cover cost them IMO state. The Supreme Court is great. PDP legal team is just not Brilliant as the APC legal team. Period!!!

Hope Should go and pay homage to Tinubu the master Planner with the greatest legal team in Nigeria

Agreeded 100%

So, the thing Don reach like this?

As a participant, you don't even need the help of The people anymore. You just have to stay in your house, write results, bribe an inec official to sign it, Kabush! You are a governor.

And you still think nigeria go better? You are definitely living in fools paradise.

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My brother it as always been so, it was what Woke did both his election as governor so no surprises here.

Donald95:
So, the thing Don reach like this?

As a participant, you don't even need the help of The people anymore. You just have to stay in your house, write results, bribe an inec official to sign it, Kabush! You are a governor.

And you still think nigeria go better? You are definitely living in fools paradise.

Samakus:



Agreeded 100%

It was even Justice Kekere-Ekun that read the lead judgement and not the CJN.

olaric:
Still doesn't remove the fact that the Supreme court is not only biased but inconsistent with it's rulings in recent history. How can the Supreme court be consistent when you have a man as incompetent as Tanko at the helm of its affairs?

You've just told us you didn't even bother to read the reasons given for the supreme court's decision, all you were after was to post whatever came into your head

WiLdFLame:

You are not a cerebral man
This judgment is not about the CJN person personality. This is purely smart and brilliant work the legal team of APC did to beat off PDP Ihedioha. This same cross petition was used by the Supreme Court to jettison Buhari team argument That Atiku was not a true Nigerian. This same loop which Your PDP legal team couldn’t cover cost them IMO state. The Supreme Court is great. PDP legal team is just not Brilliant as the APC legal team. Period!!!

Hope Should go and pay homage to Tinubu the master Planner with the greatest legal team in Nigeria

You obviously took your time to read the reasons given unlike some who wouldn't bother because their itchy fingers wouldn't allow them to.
Kudos

Area4Area:
You've just told us you didn't even bother to read the reasons given for the supreme court's decision, all you were after was to post whatever came into your head

.

I read it and then did that a second time because I knew someone like you would say a thing like this. Until we begin to see things objectively and not let politics becloud our reasoning, then Nigeria will never make that much desired progress. Morally and academically, the CJN does not deserve to be there, so any judgement he leads others in delivering will be subject to thorough scrutiny. This is my view, and I am 100% entitled to it.

olaric:
.

I read it and then did that a second time because I knew someone like you would say a thing like this. Until we begin to see things objectively and not let politics becloud our reasoning, then Nigeria will never make that much desired progress. Morally and academically, the CJN does not deserve to be there, so any judgement he leads others in delivering will be subject to thorough scrutiny. This is my view, and I am 100% entitled to it.

If you had read it as you said, what was being talked about was the legality of the decision taken and not the presence of the CJN, was the decision according to law of the land?

I'd suggest you'd bring out a pen and paper, read the reasons and this time, slowly. Jot every point down and make a summary, you'd understand it better. If you can see why the decision was OK, cool and if you feel otherwise, get a good lawyer to explain the jargons written there because those words could be affecting your full understanding of the whole text and that's why your argument is all about the presence of the CJN.

olaric:
.

I read it and then did that a second time because I knew someone like you would say a thing like this. Until we begin to see things objectively and not let politics becloud our reasoning, then Nigeria will never make that much desired progress. Morally and academically, the CJN does not deserve to be there, so any judgement he leads others in delivering will be subject to thorough scrutiny. This is my view, and I am 100% entitled to it.

Bro leave Area4Area he is empty and always supporting evil. You cannot get something good from him.

The issue is not about Hope or Emeka. It is about the supreme court and INEC. See the supreme court ought ensure its judgement satisfies both jurispondence and arethmatics. Right now there is an established case of overvoting in Imo state. The law says that when such occurs, the election should be cancelled.
The supreme court in its judgement stated that Uchr Nwosu was the authentic candidate of APC but had to be disqualifed for double candidacy. By this judgement the supreme court has rubbished itself.

PFRB:
The issue is not about Hope or Emeka. It is about the supreme court and INEC. See the supreme court ought ensure its judgement satisfies both jurispondence and arethmatics. Right now there is an established case of overvoting in Imo state. The law says that when such occurs, the election should be cancelled.
The supreme court in its judgement stated that Uchr Nwosu was the authentic candidate of APC but had to be disqualifed for double candidacy. By this judgement the supreme court has rubbished itself.

The supreme court did not disqualify hope.it agreed that he may have been apc's candidate but did not make any declaratory or consequential order since it has no jurisdiction to do that as hope and apc were not joined.
According to the constitution,you establish overvoting through voters register not card reader...