.Fixes Rerun Election April 15
.Ogbuagu, Akarachi, OZB, Nwadike Return To Polls
The election exercise in Nigeria may have come and gone but the electoral body is not yet done with activities of the exercise as it relates to court cases awaiting the umpire.
The Independent National Electoral Commission according to reports has budgeted over N3bn to defend the results of the February 25 presidential and national assembly election and the March 18 governorship and state assembly polls.
Trumpeta learnt that several candidates who lost in the elections have filed petitions at the presidential and state election petition tribunals to challenge the outcome of the polls, as the electoral body has budgeted about N3bn for the cases.
So far, over 100 election petitions have been filed by aggrieved candidates and their parties across the country.
The presidential candidates of the Peoples Democratic Party, Atiku Abubakar; the Labour Party, Peter Obi; the Action Alliance, Solomon Okangbuan; Allied People’s Movement, Chichi Ojei, have also filed petitions for the nullification of the presidential election results.
INEC had on March 1 declared the All Progressives Congress presidential candidate, Bola Tinubu, as the winner of the February 25 presidential election, but the five candidates filed petitions seeking the nullification of the poll.
Also, election petition tribunals in over 12 states have equally received petitions from National Assembly candidates who are not satisfied with the results of the just concluded elections.
The states where the petitions had been received included Edo, Plateau, Ondo, Kwara, Ogun, Bayelsa, Oyo, Osun, Ekiti, Bauchi, Lagos and Niger states.
Some aggrieved candidates had protested in Ogun and Nasarawa states, vowing to challenge the results of the elections in court.
Last November, the INEC Chairman, Mahmood Yakubu lamented that the commission was handling over 600 cases in several courts across the federation.
Speaking at a capacity-building workshop for over 300 judges that would handle election disputes, he revealed that the cases pending against the electoral body relate to the conduct of primaries by political parties.
However, INEC in its Election Project Plan for the 2023 general election earmarked N3b for the prosecution of election-related cases.
The document which was obtained on Sunday read, in part, “Litigation and prosecution: N2,104,965,000 (2022) and #3,087,195,425 (2023). Total, N5,192,160,425.’’
The INEC election project plan also showed that the electoral umpire budgeted N886.2m for legal drafting and clearance in 2022 and 2023.
The commission allocated N337.4m for legal drafting and clearance in 2022 while N548.7m was budgeted for the same item for this year.
The Punch could not confirm the number of lawyers the electoral commission would engage to handle the numerous election petition cases lodged at the tribunals.
The Chief Press Secretary to the INEC chairman, Rotimi Oyekanmi said he did not know the number of solicitors that would be employed by the commission when asked on Sunday.
Meanwhile, INEC has fixed April 15, 2023 for the rerun election of the two federal constituencies and the state constituency in Imo State where elections were declared inconclusive.
This paper gathered that the candidates involved in the affected areas will go back to the polls come April 15 to determine winner of the elections in the areas.
The areas include; Mbaitoli/Ikeduru Federal Constituency where Uche Ogbuagu of LP, Engr Akarachi Amadi of the APC, Henry Nwawuba of APGA and Osmond Ukanocho of the PDP will have the final battle of who gets the Reps Seat in the Area.
Also, the Nkwerre/Njaba/Nwangele/Isu Federal Constituency rerun will be mainly between PDP’s Ugonna Ozuruigbo “OZB” and APC’s Harrison Nwadike to decide who represents the area at the Federal House of Assembly.
In a related development, the Ahiazu Mbaise State Constituency Seat will also witness a rerun on same date following irregularities cited as the reason with APC’s Otuibe Sam fighting against Rex Okoro of PDP and the LP candidate.
