Supreme Court affirms Benue governor’s election

The Supreme Court on Monday upheld the election of Benue State Governor Hyacinth Alia.

Mr Alia, the governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), defeated Titus Uba, his Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) rival at the 18 March 2023 poll.

Mr Uba, who was speaker of the Benue State House Assembly when he vied to rule the state, accused Nigeria’s electoral commission, INEC, and Mr Alia of electoral malpractices during the election.

After he lost his cases seeking to nullify Mr Alia’s election at the Benue State Election Petition Tribunal and the Court of Appeal, Mr Uba approached the Supreme Court where he sought to invalidate the polls.

However, a five-member panel of the Supreme Court led by John Okoro said issues raised in the appeal did not qualify as post-election matters.

Mr Uba had challenged the candidacy of Governor Alia, who ditched his cassock as a Roman Catholic priest for the APC governorship ticket.

In resolving the dispute, the Supreme Court prevailed on the lawyer to the PDP and Mr Titus, Sebastine Hon, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) to withdraw the appeal, paving the way for its dismissal on Monday.

Governor Alia, his deputy, Sam Ode, and a retinue of state officials were at the Supreme Court to witness Monday’s proceedings.

In September, the election petition tribunal, the first court of instance to sit over the disputes arising from the election, had held that it lacked jurisdiction to entertain the issues relating mostly to pre-election issues raised by Mr Uba in his petition.