Benue Governorship Tribunal Upholds Alia’s Election

The Benue State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal sitting in Makurdi has upheld the election of Governor Hyacinth Alia of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

The tribunal dismissed the petition of the Peoples Democratic Party and its governorship candidate, Titus Uba, challenging the election held on the  March 18 for lack of jurisdiction to entertain the matter.

Chairman of the three man panel of justices, Justice Ibrahim Karaye, held that the tribunal has no jurisdiction to entertain the petition as the matter raised before the tribunal are pre-election issues as captured in section 285 of the Electoral Act.

The tribunal hinged it’s decision on the fact that the petitioner ought to have pursued it’s case of non-qualification and the nomination of Governor Alia by the APC and the allegation of forged certificate and false information on form EC9 against his deputy, Sam Ode before the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), beyond the Federal High Court which dismissed the earlier suit filed by the petitioner to the Court of Appeal and not the tribunal.

According to the result declared by the INEC after the election in March, Alia, a Catholic priest won 473,933 votes ahead of his closest rival Uba, who scored 223,913.