Ikenga Ugochinyere, who was elected to the House of Representatives on the PDP platform, has been removed from office by the Imo State National and State House of Assembly Election Petitions Tribunal.
A three-member panel of the tribunal, which held its hearings in Nasarawa State, ruled unanimously on Sunday that Ugochinyere was not legally nominated by the PDP to run in the Ideato North/South Federal Constituency election that took place on February 25.
As a result, it mandated that a second election be held in the constituency by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) within 90 days.
at its main decision, Justice Anthony Olotu Akpovi, the tribunal’s chairman, expressly ordered the electoral board to conduct the additional election at 55 polling places where polls were not held on February 25.
It was decided that the PDP and its candidate ought to be kept out of the special election.
The decision came as a result of a petition that Mr. Abazu Chika Benson, a candidate for the All Progressives Congress, APC, filed before the tribunal.
INEC, Ugochinyere, the PDP, and Labour Party candidate Obi Paschal Chigozie and his organization, the LP, were listed as the first through fifth respondents in the petition with the file number EPT/IM/HR/10/2023.
You may recall that INEC had proclaimed PDP candidate Ugochinyere the election’s victor with a total of 13, 026 votes.
While Chigozie, the LP candidate, finished in second place with 5,696 votes, the petitioner, who was supported by the APC, finished in third place with 2,368 votes.
However, the APC candidate filed a petition claiming that Ugochinyere was unable to run for the House of Representatives due to his dissatisfaction with the election’s results.
Among other things, the petitioner claimed that every vote given to the PDP candidate was a waste of a vote.
According to him, the PDP held its primary election in a location outside the constituency, in violation of an express provision of the Electoral Act.
In its ruling, the tribunal emphasized that the documentary and oral evidence that had been presented to it had demonstrated that the PDP’s primary election on May 25, 2022, which produced Ugochinyere as its candidate, had taken place at Aladinma Shopping Mall, a site outside the Ideato North/South Federal Constituency.
The tribunal declared that the PDP’s primary election was unlawful based on the clause in section 84(5)(c) of the Electoral Act 2022.
It was decided that a candidate could not have won a legal primary election.
Justice Akpovi held that, “Failure of the 3rd respondent (PDP) to abide by the sacrosanct provision of the Electoral Act invalidated its sponsorship of the 2nd respondent”
According to the tribunal, section 29 (1) of the Electoral Act must be followed for a primary election to be legally genuine.
According to the ruling, Ugochinyere was ineligible at the time of the House of Representatives election since his nomination was invalid.
Furthermore, the tribunal determined that because of the margin of lead principle, the LP candidate, Chigozie, could only be proclaimed the victor of the seat given that INEC conceded that it was unable to conduct the election at 55 polling places in the constituency due to the actions of unidentified gunmen.
As a result, it gave INEC the go-ahead to conduct supplemental elections with all parties present but the PDP in the remaining voting units.
Justices Usman Kudu and Ibrahim Mohammed were the only other panelists to join in supporting the lead judgment.