Edo: SDP withdraws petition against Okpebholo at tribunal

From Godwin Tsa Abuja

The Edo State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal has dismissed the petition filed by the Social Democratic Party (SDP), seeking to nullify Governor Monday Okpebholo’s election.

Justice Wilfred Kpochi-led three-member panel tribunal dismissed the petition after it was withdrawn by the party.

At the resumed sitting yesterday, the petitioner informed the tribunal through its counsel, Mr. Jackson Ehiavhie, that it was no longer interested in pursuing the case to its logical conclusion.

He told the tribunal that he had received instructions from the national secretariat of the SDP to withdraw the matter.

Following a no-objection stance by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Governor Okpebholo and the All Progressives Congress (APC), the tribunal’s chairman, Justice Kpochi, dismissed the petition in a short ruling.

The SDP was among six political parties that approached the tribunal to invalidate the Certificate of Return issued to Governor Okpebholo on September 21, 2024.

INEC declared the APC candidate winner with 291,667 votes to defeat 17 other candidates, including Asue Ighodalo of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), who scored 247,274 votes.

Aside from the PDP and its candidate, Ighodalo, other parties that also filed petitions to challenge the outcome of the poll were the Zenith Labour Party (ZLP), Action Democratic Party (ADP), Accord Party (AP) and the Allied Peoples’ Movement (APM).

In the petition it withdrew, the SDP maintained that the election was held in fundamental breach of the provisions of the Electoral Act and the regulations and guidelines for the conduct of the election issued by INEC.

Insisting that no valid winner would have emerged from a flawed electoral process, the SDP alleged that INEC’s failure, through its presiding officers, to electronically transmit collated votes at polling units as required by law rendered the votes allocated to the second Respondent, APC, invalid.

It prayed the tribunal to hold that INEC’s declaration of Okpebholo of the APC as winner of the gubernatorial contest amounted to a nullity.