The Court of Appeal, sitting in Abuja, will start hearing on Tuesday on the appeal filed by Sai’du Umar, the Peoples Democratic Party’s governorship candidate in Sokoto state, against Governor Ahmed Aliyu of the All Progressive Congress.
Recall that the three-member Elections Petitions Tribunal, chaired by Justice Haruna Msheila, dismissed the PDP’s petitions on September 30, this year, stating the petitioners failed to substantiate the six grounds formulated in the case.
He stated that the grounds included Aliyu and Gobir’s claimed ineligibility to run for office, falsification of certificates, name variations, election fraud, and noncompliance with electoral norms.
He said Petitioners were unable to prove the allegations beyond reasonable double as required by law as 70 per cent of exhibits were out of context because they relate to state assembly elections conducted on the same dates.
According to him, to prove the forgery of two different documents of persons needed to be presented while the variation of names issues was a settled supreme court provision.
He said three subpoena witnesses were not tenable as they were not makers of the documents from the alleged primary school, while the other 28 polling units’ agenda testified could not be produced identify themselves along with their roles.
The Tribunal Chairman said the alleged 138 polling units frauds were not adduced to indicate substantial non-compliance of the elections have marred the election outcome.