The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Edo State has described the Friday’s ruling of the Election Petitions Tribunal, which affirmed the election of Governor Godwin Obaseki in the gubernatorial election in the state as laughable.
The State Chairman of the party, Chief Dan Orbih, who reacted to the judgment, said that the tribunal threw away the results obtained from the inconclusive ballot recount, saying: “for the first time ever, a judge redefined over-voting as a situation whereby the total number of votes cast exceeds the total number of registered voters. Is that not laughable? I think these are the salient issues that we will challenge.”
Chief Orbih said that the tribunal expected the party and its candidate to call over 2,000 witnesses within the 14 days allotted to prove its case, adding that it is strange that the tribunal agreed that in different units, presiding officers could adopt different standards in the conduct of same election and that there was no need for uniformity in the conduct of elections.
“Conduct of an election is not a free-for-all exercise where anyone is at liberty to apply his own discretion. What Justice Badamasi was simply saying was that whether the presiding officers followed the regulations or not did not matter.”
Chairman of the tribunal, Justice Ahmed Badamasi, had in a unanimous judgment thrown out the petition of the PDP and its governorship candidate, Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu for failing to support their pleadings with evidence as well as abandoning some pleadings in their petition. [myad]
