An Appeal Court sitting in Abuja, the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), has reserved judgment in the appeal filed by Governor Abdullahi Sule of Nasarawa State challenging the decision of the Governorship Election Petition Tribunal that nullified his victory on October 2.
Chairman of the 3-man panel of justices, Justice Onyemenem Uchechukwu announced this during Wednesday’s hearing of the after counsels to the parties adopted their written addresses.
The Court of Appeal is currently hearing a cross-appeal filed by the candidate of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in the March 18 governorship election in Nasarawa state, David Ombugadu where the Tribunal had declared him the winner of the majority votes in the March 18 governorship election in a split judgment.
Not satisfied with the decision of the tribunal, Governor Abdullahi Sule filed an appeal at the Makurdi Division of the Court of Appeal praying to the appellate court to set aside the decision of the tribunal and affirm his victory as declared by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
When the case came up, the appellant counsel, Wole Olanikpekun, SAN while adopting his five grounds of appeal, argued that the governorship election tribunal was unfair to Governor Abdullahi Sule in its judgment as the BVAS brought before the tribunal was not considered.
In his argument, counsel to David Ombugadu, Chief Kanu Agabi, SAN, urged the court to rely on his adopted brief of argument and the tribunal judgment to dismiss the appeal and affirm the judgment of the tribunal.
Having listened to the submission by counsels to the parties, the chairman of the 3-man panel of Justices, reserved judgment to a later date, saying the date would be communicated to the the parties in the matter.
Justice Uchechukwu Onyemenam after listening to all the parties in the matter said the date for the judgment would be communicated to all the parties.
On the cross-appeal filed by the PDP Governorship candidate Doctor Emmanuel Ombugadu challenging the minority judgment delivered by one of the judges at the Governorship election petition tribunal, Justice Onyemenam also reserved judgment to a later date to be communicated to all the parties.
Justice Onyemenam had earlier reserved judgment to a later date on a motion filed by counsel to Doctor Emmanuel Ombugadu seeking the court to strike out the appellant affidavit seeking to present additional facts before the court describing it as incompetent.
