2027 elections may become joke if Edo tribunal ruling is not reversed – Amadi warns

From Adanna Nnamani, Abuja

The Director of the Abuja School of Social and Political Thought, Dr. Sam Amadi, has warned that if the judgment of the Edo State Governorship Election Tribunal is allowed to stand, it will set a dangerous precedent that could turn Nigeria’s 2027 elections into “farcical, impotent rituals.”

Amadi made the statement during a press briefing in Abuja on Monday, following the April 2, judgment of the Tribunal which upheld the declaration of the All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate as winner of the 2024 Edo governorship election, despite what he described as overwhelming evidence of malpractice.

“If the judiciary allows the travesty that took place in Edo State on September 21, 2024 to stand, then we might as well all go home. 2027 and all other elections will be farcical, impotent rituals used by the ruling class to give the unilateral appointment of political officeholders the imprimatur of democratic responsibility,” Amadi cautioned.

The former Chairman of the Nigerian Electricity Regulatory Commission (NERC), described the ruling as a judicial endorsement of what he termed “an electoral coup” by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), accusing the electoral body of manipulating results and subverting the will of the people.

According to him, the tribunal ignored clear evidence that INEC violated key provisions of the Electoral Act, including Section 73(2), which mandates that serial numbers of sensitive materials such as ballot papers and result sheets be documented before voting.

He also criticized the tribunal’s rejection of evidence on technical grounds, despite what he called “well-documented discrepancies” between results uploaded on INEC’s result viewing portal (IReV) and those declared.

“In some polling units, the APC scored 31 votes on IReV, yet INEC declared 431 votes for the party using unsigned result sheets,” he said.

The organisation’s boss said the court failed to compel INEC to operate the BVAS machines in court, even though it had ordered them to be tendered as evidence.

He questioned why INEC’s failure to comply with court directives should become the burden of petitioners, noting that it is a system rigged to protect itself.

“The irony is that it was the court that ordered INEC tendered BVAS machines. Why did the court not mandate the INEC to operate the machine before the court? Why should INEC’s errors of failure be to the detriment of the victim of its manipulation? It is sad that the tribunal gives INEC the opportunity to violate the law and go free and punish the electorates and the victims of the manipulation by INEC and the politicians,” he queried.

Amadi maintained that the Abuja School is non-partisan and has no interest in which candidate wins, but is committed to defending the integrity of Nigeria’s democracy. “The issue here is not PDP versus APC. It is INEC versus the Nigerian people. And now, it appears the judiciary has joined in enabling the subversion of democracy,” he stated.

He therefore called on appellate courts to review and overturn the tribunal’s verdict, warning that continued judicial tolerance of INEC’s failings would erode public faith in elections.