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From Paul Osuyi, Asaba
Attempt by three governorship candidates to unseat Governor Sheriff Oborevwori of Delta State through separate petitions failed on Friday as the election petitions tribunal sitting in Asaba, dismissed the petitions for lacking in merit.
The petitioners are the immediate past Deputy President of the Senate, Ovie Omo-Agege of the All Progressive Congress (APC), former Minister of State for Education, Kenneth Gbagi of the Social Democratic Party (SDP) and Mr. Ken Pela of Labour Party
They had challenged the declaration of Oborevwori of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) as winner of the March 18 election by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
In the first judgement read by the chairman of the three-member tribunal, Justice C.H. Ahuchaogu, held the petitioners, Omo-Agege and APC were unable to prove the case of substantial non-compliance with the Electoral Act.
Ahuchaogu also ruled that the petitioners failed to prove that the second respondent, Oborevwori was not duly elected by majority of lawful votes cast.
On the issue of over voting, Justice Ahuchaogu said whilst the petitioners pleaded BVAS machine in their petition, it did not tender the BVAS machine or its extract to prove non accreditation which allegedly resulted in over voting.
“In line and obedience to the Supreme Court decision, we agree with the counsels of the second and third respondents that to prove over voting, the petitioners must tender the BVAS machine and not the reports from the back-end servers.
On corrupt practices, Justice Ahuchaogu said the petitioners failed to prove that the alleged inflation of votes substantially affected the outcome of the election and resolved it in favour of the respondents.
He also resolved the issue of alleged cancellation of Bowen Ward 6 in Warri South against the petitioners.
In another judgement, the tribunal threw out the petition of Gbagi for lacking in merit and abuse of court process.
Besides, the tribunal struck out the petition of Ken Pela of Labour Party for unsubstantiated allegations.
Meanwhile, both Omo-Agege and Gbagi have rejected the judgement.
