The Abuja High Court dismissed a lawsuit on Wednesday that Senator Smart Adeyemi, a candidate in the All Progressives Congress’ Kogi State governorship primary, had brought against the selection of the party’s nominee, Usman Ododo, on the grounds that it lacked merit.
Justice J.K. Omotosho ruled in the case “Smart Adeyemi v. APC & 2 Ors” under the case number “FHC/CS/556/2023” that Adeyemi’s claims were criminal in character because he claimed that the elections were rigged and the results were falsified.
He stated that the applicant has to establish the claims of forgery and result falsification beyond a reasonable doubt.
The applicant must meet the burden by producing the forged result or both the original and the forged results, the court stated, adding that failure to do so “is fatal to the applicant’s case.”
As the applicant only produced evidence from his Ward in the Ijumu LGA, Justice Omotosho concluded that the claim that the election was invalid.
In any case, he claimed, the Respondents who had submitted the INeC monitoring reports had refuted this evidence. INeC has the responsibility of overseeing the election.
“In this case, INEC attached its monitoring report and also attached copies of the result, police report confirming the conduct of the election signed by the Commissioner of Police, the case of the Applicant has no basis,” he said.
As a result, Justice Omotosho dismissed the case for lack of merit and said “In the final analysis, having reviewed all the evidence in this matter, I have no doubt that the APC primary election result held in all the wards of Kogi State on the 14th day of April 2023 and I so hold.”
“This Honourable Court will not allow the will of a few just like that of the Applicant to overide the will of the majority. The Applicant’s case has no merit. It is hereby dismissed.” Omotosho concluded
