The election of Governor Ayodele Fayose in the June 21 governorship election in Ekiti State was Friday upheld in Abuja by the Ekiti state governorship election petition tribunal.
The tribunal held that the witnesses paraded by the petitioner were unable to provide concrete evidence to support the claims of corrupt practices at the polling units and that their testimonies did not support claims that the election did not comply substantially with the provisions of the Electoral Act.
“The testimonies of these witnesses are unsatisfactory and their inability to give the names of the polling units as well as the names of their agents at those unnamed polling units shows that most of them that gave evidence of these alleged non compliance did not vote at the election as such their testimonies failed to support their claims. None of them gave evidence on the improper accreditation or manipulation of accreditation. The petitioner failed to substantiate the allegation of improper accreditation or non accreditation of voters”, it ruled.
The panel also said that the failure of the petitioner to call witnesses from most of the polling units to prove the allegation of improper and or non accreditation of voters at the polling units damaged the substance of the petition.
It also rejected claims by the APC that the election was systematically and scientifically conducted by the use of indelible photo chronic and vanishing inks that fades within minutes in such a way to favour the emergence of the PDP candidate at the election.
The tribunal equally threw out the issue of Fayose’s disqualification saying it does not have jurisdiction over a pre election matter because the issue of the disqualification was already before an Ekiti State High Court which APC was aware of.
The tribunal similarly threw out two other grounds of the petition that bothers on display of voters register and the contravention of the code of conduct by Fayose, saying they are pre-election issues.
The tribunal also threw out substantial paragraphs of the petition on the ground that they were made up of imprecise statements like “officers and men of the armed forces”, “agents of the PDP”, “harassment of the supporters of the petitioners”, “arresting of key supporters and chieftains of the petitioner” which had no names, descriptions or proper identifications of those persons who the petitioners are referring.
The tribunal said the affected paragraphs are nebulous, speculative, not clear and confusing, and pointed out that the petitioners failed to provide the names of the polling units, where such harassment and intimidation of their supporters took place.
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