The Supreme Court has dismissed the appeal filed by the All Progressives Congress, APC, and Uche Nnaji, against Governor Peter Mbah.
Delivering the judgment on Friday, the 5-member panel of judges upheld that the APC and Nnaji legal team filed invalid brief of argument and failed to convince the court with cogent reason why the appellants’ incompetent brief should be allowed.
Justice Tijani Abubakar held that since the appellants’ brief was found to be invalid, the invalidity also affect the appeal in respect of which the appeal was filed; hence he dismissed the appeal filed by the appellants.
Recall that Uche Nnaji, the APC gubernatorial candidate in the 2023 election challenged the declaration of Peter Mbah of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) by the Independent National Electoral commission (INEC) as winner of the election.
Nnaji who is now the Minister of Innovation, Science and Technology of the Federal Republic of Nigeria contended Peter Mbah’s victory arguing that Mbah was not constitutionally qualified to vie for the office of the governor at the time of the election for allegedly presenting an alleged forged certificate to the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC.
Nnaji’s petition to disqualify Peter Mbah’s victory was dismissed on 20th June 2023 by Enugu State Governorship Election Petitions Tribunal and his appeal to the Court of Appeal Enugu was also dismissed on 18th July 2023 by Justice J.O.K Oyewole as the Court upheld the Tribunal’s judgment.
Delivering judgment on the petition marked EPT/EN/GOV/05/23, Chairman of the Tribunal, Justice Akano, said the lawsuit was not filed in accordance with the provisions of the Electoral Act and could not be heard pursuant to paragraph 18(3) (4) of the First Schedule of the Electoral Act, 2022.
Consequently, Nnaji approached the Court of Appeal, praying it to send the dismissed petition back to the Tribunal for hearing and determination of the suit; upon dismissal, he went to the apex court who also ruled against him.
