APC asks tribunal to upturn Fintiri’s victory for ‘over-voting’


The All Progressives Congress (APC) has asked the Adamawa State Election Petitions Tribunal to upturn the victory of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the governorship election conducted in the state last month because of ‘over voting and non-use of card readers’ in 10 LGAs.

The March 9 governorship election had extended to March 28 when a rerun was conducted in some polling units in 14 LGAs, with the PDP coming top with a total of 376,552 votes and the APC coming close behind with 336,386 votes.

The petition by the APC arrived pretty late to the tribunal, just before end of deadline on Wednesday, a time when many had concluded that the party had decided to let the governorship election go, but the Secretary of the Adamawa Election Petitions Tribunal, Godwin Ezenwa, confirmed Thursday that the tribunal had received the petition of the APC.

He confirmed also that the tribunal had a petition from the Movement for the Restoration of Defense of Democracy (MRDD), adding that the two brought to three the number of parties that had submitted petitions against the governorship election in Adamawa State, after a petition earlier on by the Action Peoples Party (APP).

He said the tribunal had previously received two petitions against the senatorial election, seven against the House of Representatives election and 10 against the state House of Assembly poll, bringing to 22 the total number of petitions the tribunal had received on the elections.

The APC organizing secretary, Ahmad Lawal, who spoke on the petition of the party, said the party was praying the tribunal to declare incumbent Governor Mohammed Bindow as the winner of the governorship poll.

“There was over voting in Madagali, Yola-North, Michika, Numan, Lamurde, Demsa, Gombi, Song and Hong LGAs of the state. What we are praying is for the tribunal to declare Gov Mohammed Bindow Winner or conduct rerun for the governorship in the 10 local government areas,” Ahmad Lawan said.

In its own petition to the tribunal, the Movement for the Restoration and Defense of Democracy (MRDD) claimed that its logo was omitted from the ballot for the March 9 governorship election.

The candidate of the party in the election, Mr Eric Theman, said that he was asking the tribunal to order fresh election across the state over non-inclusion of his party’s logo on the ballot.

The MRDD had first gone to the state high court immediately after the March 9 governorship election to seek nullification of the election for reason of the logo omission, but the court had dismissed the case for inability of the plaintiff to prove his case.

Leave a Reply