A FEDERAL High Court in Yenagoa has dismissed a case seeking to disqualify the All Progressives Congress (APC) governorship candidate and his running mate from the November 11 off-cycle election poll.
The case, filed by an APC member, Isikima Johnson, was declared statute-barred by the court on Tuesday, November 7.
The case numbered FHC/YNG/CS/114/2023 was declared statute barred by the presiding judge, B. O. Quadri. Consequently, the court said it lacked jurisdiction to consider it.
Johnson filed the lawsuit, claiming that the party’s deputy governorship candidate, Joshua Maciver, was unfit to be on the ballot and that the party conducted an unlawful primary election.
Johnson contested the state’s APC governorship primary in April but lost.
She said that Maciver had previously been found guilty by a court and had lied under oath about his conviction history on his nomination documents to the Independent National Electoral Commission.
However, the court ruled that the lawsuit against Maciver was banned by statute because it was filed after the obligatory 14-day period.
Timipre Sylva, the APC candidate, picked Maciver as his running mate.
The ICIR reported earlier that the Court of Appeal sitting in Abuja on Tuesday, October 30, reversed the disqualification of Sylva as the valid candidate of the APC for the Bayelsa State governorship election slated for November 11.
The court, in a unanimous decision by a three-member panel of justices, restored him as the party’s candidate in the election scheduled for this Saturday, November 16.
It held that the claimant, Demesuoyefa Kolomo, lacked the locus standi to do so.
Consequently, the appellate court, aside from setting aside the verdict of the High Court that sacked Silva, awarded a cost of N1 million against Kolomo.
On October 10, The ICIR reported that a Federal High Court in Abuja disqualified Sylva from participating in the election.
In a suit marked FHC/ABJ/CS/821/2023, Kolomo, a member of the APC in the state, asked the court to determine Sylva’s eligibility for the election, given his past terms as the state governor from May 29, 2007, to April 15, 2008, and from May 27, 2008, to January 27, 2012.
The court ruled in the applicant’s favour, claiming that Silva, a two-term Minister of State for Petroleum Resources in former President Muhammadu Buhari’s government, had taken the oath of office twice, making him ineligible to contest again for governor. But Silva won at the Appeal Court.
Bayelsa joins Imo and Kogi states for the off-cycle election on Saturday.
The ICIR had, in a report, presented the top candidates for the polls in the three states and their chances.
A reporter with the ICIR
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