The above is the day the Supreme Court will consider the 2019 Governorship election petitions for Adamawa, Bauchi, Kano, and Sokoto emanating from the decisions the Appeal Court on the matters. By the end of tomorrow the nation would know if the status quo is remaining in those states or another Imo has happened.
Speaking of Imo State, a lot of controversy, largely due to emotions and not rationality, have trailed that historic Supreme Court decision. Many lawyers and jurists have hailed it as been on sound legal footing. I hope the PDP will have some restraint and allow our democracy continue its growth into adulthood. Our democracy is not in danger.
I digress.
So lets look at each state and see a forecast of what might be at the end of tomorrow.
Adamawa State
The APC’s Mohammed Bindow Umar Jubrilla lost to the PDP’s Umaru Ahmadu Fintiri, a former Speaker of the state, by 40,166 votes. The Tribunal and Appeal Court affirmed PDP’s victory. The Appeal Court actually threw APC Appeal out for lacking in merit.
Forecast
The Supreme Court will side with the Appeal Court and throw APC’s case out for lacking in merit and affirm Alhaji Fintiri’s victory at the March 9 Governorship election. So the status quo will remain in Adamawa.
Bauchi
At the Governorship election for Bauchi State held on March 9, 2019, candidate of the PDP Bala Abdulkadir Mohammed who was FCT Minister under the Goodluck Jonathan Administration, defeated the incumbent Governor Mohammed Abdullahi Abubakar, a member of the APC by 5318 votes. The APC appealed and lost both at the Tribunal and the Appeal Court. At the Appeal Court, the Justices in an unanimous decision threw out APC’s case for lacking in merit. The APC therefore decided to appeal at the Supreme Court.
Forecast
Going by the fact that the Tribunal and Appeal Court decisions were unanimous, the Supreme Court will side with the lower courts and affirm Bala Mohammed’s victory at the 2019 election. The status quo will remain the same in Bauchi.
Sokoto
The battle for Aminu Tambuwal’s seat as governor of Sokoto State is a very interesting one. At the March 9, 2019 election, INEC decided the election was inconclusive because the number of cancelled votes was way higher than the difference between the PDP’s Aminu Tambuwal and the APC’s Ahmed Aliyu, who were the frontline contenders. After the supplementary election, the drama continued as Tambuwal only managed a slim win, by 342 votes, over his APC contender. The matter went to court and both the Tribunal and Appeal Court decided in favor of the PDP. At the Appeal Court, the Justices, unanimously concluded that there was no case of over voting, even with the very close margin of votes, as contended by the APC. So APC went to the Supreme Court.
Forecast
This is a very dicey one. Even though the Appeal Court decision was unanimous, the Supreme Court will look very closely at APC’s claim of over-voting. If it finds even the slightest proof of that, the court might trigger a recount or even ask for a rerun of the supplementary election. This forecast is 50/50. Tambuwal should hold his breathe.
Kano
This is the moment of reckoning for the controversial governor of Kano State. During the equally controversial March 2019 election that was marred by reports of election irregularities, a supplementary election was required to separate the APC and PDP. APC’s Abdullahi Ganduje ended up defeating PDP’s Abah Yusuf by 8982 votes, in an election where 2,058,408 votes were cast. The PDP went to court and lost at the Tribunal and Appeal Court. At the Appeal Court, the PDP argued that INEC illegally canceled results in 207 polling units (PU) which led to the bye-election that was held that finally got Ganduje declared winner. APC on the other hand contended that INEC did not cancel the votes in the 207 PUs, but could not collate results in those PUs because PDP agents snatched the ballot boxes at those places.
Forecast
The Supreme Court will consider if INEC illegally canceled the votes in the 207 PUs or INEC just could not collate the results due to ballot box snatching. If it finds out that INEC indeed collated then canceled the votes, then Ganduje’s goose is cooked and it would be declared he did not win the election, but if the court finds that due to ballot box snatching, INEC could not collate results, then PDP’s case will be thrown out and Ganduje will be affirmed as Governor of Kano State. The forecast is that the latter is what will be the case.
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Henry Okelue is an IT Consultant in Abuja – Henry is a NewsWireNGR Contributor..
