Kogi guber: Wada wins again

The Kogi State Governor, Captain Ibrahim Wada, has  won another legal battle as the Court of Appeal on Wednesday dismissed an appeal filed by the governorship candidate of  the Congress for Progressive Changes (CPC),  James Ocholi, SAN, challenging his election. Read more

In a unanimous judgment, the court  also dismissed a similar appeal filed by the All Nigerian Peoples Party (ANPP).

In the judgment delivered by Justice I.T.A. George-Mbama, the appellate  court held that the issues raised in the two appeals were electoral matters that should have been taken to the electoral tribunal for adjudication.

It further held that the high court was right in dismissing the suit and consequently, upheld the decision of the trial court. Before dismissing the case, Justice George-Mbama chastised the two appellants for filing two separate appeals even though they jointly filed the case as plaintiffs before the High Court.

He said lawyers and parties should avoid overburdening the court by filing separate appeals when they could have filed only one appeal.

The court said:  “The second appeal is similar to the one earlier decided. The parties are the same. At the lower court, they were together. They have similar interests. They still have the same interests even in the appeal. It is therefore, surprising to see them file different appeals. This is an unwholesome practice as it had overburdened the court.

“The mere fact that a federal agency is a party does not make it a case for a Federal High Court. It is the issue in dispute and the law that determines jurisdiction,” he added.

Justice George-Mbama said instead of filing their petitions before the tribunal, they waited for Wada to be sworn in and then went to the Federal High Court to challenge his election. The court noted that the two appeals were challenging the election of Wada and his qualification to contest the governorship election in Kogi.

This, the court said, could only be done  at the election tribunal and not the Federal High Court. He said: “Where a court lacks the competence to determine  a matter an appellate court will uphold the decision of the high court declining jurisdiction.

“We hold that the trial court was right in holding that it lacked jurisdiction.” The court had earlier upheld Wada’s election in an appeal filed by, Jilbrin Isah, a member of the same  party, the Peoples Democratic Party.

Culled from The Sun newspaper