Imo guber: Constitute fresh panel for review, CSOs task CJN


Ahead of Tuesday’s hearing of an application filed by the immediate-past Governor of Imo state, Emeka Ihedioha, an alliance of Civil Societies across the country, have called on the Chief Justice on the Nigeria (CJN), Ibrahim Tanko Mohammed, to constitute a fresh Supreme Court to review earlier judgment.
The apex court had, last month, sacked Ihedioha of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as governor of the state declaring Senator Hope Uzodinma the authentic winner of the poll.

However, Ihedioha and the PDP have been pushing for a reversal of the judgment.
Addressing journalists, Sunday in Abuja, spokesperson of the group Livinus Ibiang said: “A new panel should look into the review. The Court owes Imolites and Nigerians in general the clarity as to what happened to the votes of the PDP and other parties in the 388 units tendered by the APC and its candidate.
”The Court of Appeal had earlier dismissed the petition of Senator Hope Uzodinma as incompetent and struck it out. However, the Supreme Court did not consider the appeal of Hope Uzodinma on this point and so the judgement of the Court of Appeal dismissing the petition still stands or subsists. 
“There was therefore no basis for the Supreme Court to pronounce on the Appeal and declare Hope Uzodinma, elected.
“The judgment was delivered without jurisdiction in that by virtue of S.140(2) of the Electoral Act, once the Court says that the election was invalid, the only possible judgement the Court is allowed to give is a nullification of the election, and not to declare Hope Uzodinma, winner.”


According to him,  “There was no proof before the Court nor did the Supreme Court state how it arrived at the declaration that Hope Uzodinma met the constitutionally required geographical spread. To meet this requirement, the Supreme Court ought to state the scores and percentages of all the 70 candidates that contested the election, Local Government by Local Government. This was not done by the Supreme Court and therefore had no basis and jurisdiction to declare Hope Uzodinma winner of the election.


“The judgment was a nullity having been obtained by fraud or deceit in that Hope Uzodinma fraudulently misled the Supreme Court into holding that a total of 213,495 were unlawfully excluded from his votes. The fraud was further orchestrated by the fact that the total votes cast was more than the number of voters accredited to vote.
“The fraud was further demonstrated by the document tendered by INEC (FORM EC40G) which clearly showed that there were no valid elections in the disputed 388 polling units.
“The judgement was a nullity because it was given per incuriam, which means that the Supreme Court did not advert its attention to some existing laws and facts even on the face of the proceedings. It is no longer news that there was a judicial Tsunami when the apex court on January 14, 2020 controversially nullified the election of Mr. Emeka Ihedioha as the lawfully elected governor of Imo state.”
According to him, “Since that curious judgment, Nigerians from all walks of life, irrespective of political and religious persuasion have voiced concern over that miscarriage of justice.”

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