The Senator Representing Kogi West, Dino Melaye and his Predecessor, Smart Adeyemi will now wait till a later date as the Appeal Court has reserved ruling over the disputed senatorial election.
The Kogi State National Assembly/State Assembly Election Petition Tribunal had in August voided INEC’s declaration of Melaye as winner of the Senatorial election.
However, Melaye approached the Appellate Court on three grounds that the court should set aside the ruling of the tribunal.
Melaye insisted that the tribunal failed to evaluate the testimonies of its witnesses and no recourse to the documentary evidence he submitted to the tribunal.
He also said it was wrong for the Tribunal to cancel the election based on over voting rather than voter register as required by law. He also held that the claim of mutilation of result sheet was untenable because the final result of the senatorial election was endorsed by agents of the candidates and the parties and that the petitioners failed to establish that the alleged mutilated result substantially affected the final result collation.
Smart Adeyemi and the All Progressives Congress APC on their part argued that INEC breached an order of the federal high court that the senatorial election result must be collated and announced in Kabba, the senatorial district headquarters and not in Lokoja as done by INEC .
They alleged that while their agents were in Kabba waiting for the collation, the INEC officials and agents of the appellants allegedly colluded and secretly moved the result collation to Lokoja where the result sheets were allegedly mutilated to favour Melaye.
They also insisted that mutilation of results, dated Feb. 25 instead of Feb.23, was so apparent and that over voting was so established to the tune of over 48,000 votes. They, therefore, urged the court to dismiss the appeals and uphold the majority decision of the tribunal.
Justice Abubakar Datti Yahaya, who presided over the three appeals announced that a date for judgment delivery would be communicated to parties as soon as it is fixed.