Emmanuel Oladesu
Will the Supreme Court accede to the critical request by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) for the review of its latest judgment on the Imo State governorship poll?
To legal experts, the main opposition party may be day-dreaming. Although the apex court verdict is final, PDP is yet to embrace the reality. In common parlance, it appears the party is trying to ‘find a way around it’ by politicising a pure constitutional matter.
Regressing into self-pity, PDP is taking an already decided case to the court of public opinion, particularly the waiting hands of social media spin doctors, perhaps, in its bid to fuel sentiments and influence public perception about the topmost temple of justice.
In what seems like a deliberate incitement against the judiciary, under the guise of exercising the freedom of speech, a serious attempt is systematically being made to pull down the bench in post-Onoghen era.
A party that will be able to confront future challenges should be given to introspection. Instead of putting the unexpected setback behind them and returning to the drawing board to plan realistically for future elections, PDP leaders are embarking on a futile journey to nowhere.
The former Imo State PDP governorship flag bearer, Chief Emeka Ihedioha, who defeated the All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate, Senator Hope Uzodinma, at the tribunal and Court of Appeal before losing at the Supreme Court, said the verdict was “unfair and unjust.” The outburst understandably emanated from the pain of the heart, having held forte in the Government House for seven months, only to be kicked out as an interloper.
Read Also: Ihedioha, Uzodinma: The triumph of justice
But, the PDP National Chairman was assailed by a curious amnesia. Prince Uche Secondus forgot that the same Supreme Court also recently nullified the House of Assembly, governorship, House of Representatives and senatorial elections won by the APC in Zamfara State and that PDP candidates were beneficiaries. Although the people of Zamfara voted for the APC, its fruits of labour were harvested by candidates rejected at the polls by the electorate.
Burning with partisan anger, Secondus said the verdict on Imo poll was a miscarriage of justice; an irrational, unfounded, provocative product of executive manipulation. He passed a vote of no confidence on Chief Justice Tanko Muhammad, saying the number one jurist and all those who heard the case should abdicate because they are judicial coup plotters.
The Imo election is now history. But, the lessons are instructive. Whenever the ballot box is assaulted by unruly politicians, security agents and electoral officers on poll day, the battle will always shift to the court, which is the last hope and final arbiter. What is required is that the judiciary should patriotically play its role in defense of democracy without fear or favour. But, the political class should also invest trust and confidence in the court, notwithstanding the outcome, especially when the three avenues of electoral justice-the tribunal, Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court-have been explored.
More importantly, politicians, candidates and electoral officers have an important lesson to learn on the danger of subverting the will of the people on poll day. It is now a legal fact that the court frowns at exclusion. Also, learned counsel should be very diligent and more dedicated to their clients. The cost of litigation is burdensome.
In the future, the prevailing circumstances that attempted to dent the image of the Imo contest can still reoccur. The antidote is the setting up of an electoral offence tribunal or court for the trial of electoral criminals or offenders. With a benefit of hindsight, the scope of electoral offences should now be enlarged to include unintelligent “unit vote results exclusion.”
Indisputably, rigging and other forms of malpractices can only become old fashioned or outdated in Nigeria, if people go to jail for electoral terrorism.
The genesis of the legal fireworks in Imo was the miscalculation of lawful votes cast, to the disadvantage of the appellant. The bone of contention was the exclusion of results from 328 polling units from votes that should have been recorded for its candidate, Uzodinma. The Supreme Court emphasised that the Chief Returning Officer erred by excluding the results from the polling units. When voters vote and the votes do not count, it is an equivalence of disenfranchisement.
The excluded votes were huge and remarkably, they gave Uzodinma a clear lead. They were put at 213, 695 while that of Ihedioha was 1, 903. The APC candidate claimed that his stronghold was electorally emasculated. Yet, as the Supreme Court noted, these core facts, which were critical to the determination of the petition, were glossed over by the tribunal and the Court of Appeal.
There are puzzles: Do ward collation officers have power in law to cancel or reject results? At what stage and who has the power under the Electoral Act to either reject or cancel results after the counting of votes? Does the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has power in law to exclude polling units results duly affirmed by the various polling units presiding officers?
Basking in the euphoria of multiple victories at the tribunal and the Appeal Court, the seven-month governor could not spare thought for the imminence of retributive justice at the highest tribunal.
Ihedioha’s lawyers could not prove beyond reasonable doubt that the exclusion of the disputed units was right in law. Also, they did not file a cross petition for the nullification of the results from the excluded units. Some legal experts have described the omission as a fatal legal error. Yet, without a cross petition, the grounds for questioning the elections in the disputed units could not be competently raised in Ihedioha’s defense to Uzodinma’s petition under Section 138 (1) of the Electoral Act. According to legal minds, even without the cross-petition praying for the nullification of the results, the PDP flag bearer was forbidden by law to raise the issue of alleged irregularities in the results in a mere statement of defense.
In the final result declared by the Returning Officer, Vice Chancellor, Michael Okpara University of Agriculture, Umudike, Abia State, Professor Francis Otunta, Ihedioha scored 273, the highest number of votes; Uche N wosu of the Action Alliance (AA) polled 190, 364, Senator Ifeanyi Araraume of the All Progressive Grand Alliance (APGA) got 114,676 votes and Uzodinma, who came fourth, got 96,458 votes. Ikedi Ohakim of the Accord got 6, 846 votes. None of them, except Uzodinma claimed that his votes were withheld.
In his petition, he prayed the Supreme Court to declare him winner, claiming that he scored the majority of lawful votes cast. Uzodinma maintained that in the results declared at the poling unit level by the presiding officers, he got 213,695 votes in 388 units. He prayed the court to retrieve the excluded votes and add them to the figures declared by the electoral commission, adding that, if they are added, he will emerge as the candidate with the highest number of votes.
In its judgment by Justice Kudirat Kekere-Ekun, the Supreme Court declared: “Votes due to the appellants, that is, Senator Hope Uzodinma and the All Progressives Congress (APC), from the 388 polling units were wrongly excluded from the scores ascribed to the appellants. It is hereby ordered that the appellants’ votes from the 388 units, unlawfully excluded from the appellants’ scores, shall be added to the results earlier declared by the third respondent (INEC).”
The legal punishment for the emasculation, subversion and desecration of the electoral process is the judicial retrieval of stolen mandate, to the consternation of desperate beneficiary of short-lived gains of electoral fraud.
Had Uzodinma been declared winner by the umpire, another scenario may have been built. It is noteworthy that Ihedioha and his party alleged malpractices in Mbaise axis. He may have been in a vantage position to challenge the APC victory and muster the legal strength to prove his allegations of irregularities.
For APC, the verdict symbolised the triump of justice. The significance of the judicial victory is that the ruling party, despite its protracted crisis, division and mismanagement of its primary in Imo chapter, has managed to retain its footing in the Southeast. Also, PDP will now need to readjust in a harder way to the inevitable role of opposition in the state.
But, can the judgment still be reviewed by the Supreme Court? Can there still be final of finals? Opinion is divided. Although there were few instances in the past, many experts have doubted the likelihood, saying that it is remote because the demand for reexamination appears to be mischievous, unfeasible, superfulous, and unrealistic.
There are probable conditions for judicial reevaluation at the level of the Supreme Court. The first is the discovery of glaring clerical errors or mistakes, which will make correction compelling and justifiable. The second is if the court lacked jurisdiction. The third is if the judgment is a nullity. The fourth is if there is an evidence that the judgment was obtained by fraud.
In the absence of these criteria, the verdict is final and both parties have to brace for a show of strength in future polls.
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