Do the police have an insight into next Tuesday’s final verdict by Supreme Court on Kogi state governorship election?
This was the trending question in the state after the Police Command took the unprecedented step by banning public jubilation and demonstration fours days to the delivery of the Supreme Court judgment.
The Commissioner of Police, Malam Abdullahi Chafe, announced the ban at a news conference in Lokoja on Friday.
Chafe said that intelligence reports reaching the command revealed that some miscreants were planning to foment trouble if the Supreme Court judgment should go contrary to their expectations.
The police commissioner warned that individuals or group of persons who cause break down of law and order would face full wrath of the law.
He urged various political parties to call their members and supporters to order so that peace would reign after the delivery of judgment.
“Kogi State is greater than any body. Police will not waist anytime in dealing with law breakers within the constitutional requirement,” he said.
The Supreme Court will deliver judgment in two separate appeals filed by former governor Idris Wada, and the governorship running mate to late Prince Abubakar Audu, James Faleke.
Both are challenging the election of Governor Yahaya Bello.
Wada and Faleke had both appealed the decision of the appeal court which upheld the election of Bello on November 21, 2015.
In a judgment made by a five-member panel of justices, read by Justice Jummai Sankey, on August 4, the appellate court upheld the verdict of the Kogi State Governorship Election Petitions Tribunal in Abuja, which dismissed James Faleke’s petition.
But in Wada’s appeal, Justice Obande Festus Ogbuinya gave a dissenting judgment, cancelling the election of Bello, on the grounds that he was not validly nominated for the election following Audu’s death, and that he failed to nominate a running mate for the election.
He ordered the withdrawal of the governor’s Certificate of Return and the conduct of fresh election.
However, the panel ruled that Faleke failed to prove the allegation that Bello was not qualified and registered to be voted for the as provided by the Electoral Act.
The panel also faulted the decision of Faleke to challenge his substitution at the election tribunal rather than the regular court, being a pre-election matter and an internal affair of the APC.
Wole Olanipekun (SAN) had said that INEC ought to have returned Faleke as governor, having polled 240, 867 votes with the APC’s late candidate, Prince Audu, on November 21, 2015, before Bello’s 6, 885 votes in the supplementary election of December 5, 2015, in line with Section 179 (2) 181 (1) of the 1999 Constitution.
On his part, Wada’s counsel, Chris Uche (SAN), contended that the APC had no qualified candidate in the election, adding that having scored the highest lawful votes of 25 per cent cast in, at least, two-third of the area councils in the state, he should be returned as governor.
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