Abuja Division of the Court of Appeal yesterday affirmed Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan as the duly elected Senator for Kogi Central senatorial district of Kogi State.
The appellate court affirmed the judgement of the Kogi State National/State Assembly election petitions tribunal, which earlier pronounced Akpoti-Uduaghan of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as rightful winner of the February 25 National Assembly elections instead of Abubakar Sadiku-Ohere of the All Progressives Congress (APC) who was earlier declared winner of the exercise by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
Dissatisfied with the verdict of the tribunal, Sadiku-Ohere had approached the Court of Appeal seeking for respite.
But a three-man panel of Justices of the appellate court affirmed the judgement of the tribunal shortly after it dismissed Sadiku-Ohere’s appeal for lacking in merit.
According to the superior court, the appellant failed to provide convincing evidence why the judgment of the Tribunal should be set aside in his favour.
Justice Hamma Barka of the court subsequently held that Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan PDP, having won the majority of lawful votes cast at the poll, is winner of the Kogi Central Senatorial District poll.
Akpoti-Uduaghan had contested the declaration of Sadiku-Ohere as winner of the election on the grounds that INEC failed to input election results from Ajaokuta, Adavi and Okehi local government areas of the senatorial district, whose votes gave her the winning margin above Sadiku-Ohere.
The rejected and excluded results were then added to the overall results, which then revealed that the PDP candidate won the majority of lawful votes cast at the poll.
The appellate court, in rejecting the APC candidate’s appeal, held that INEC which has the duty of conducting and collating election results failed to provide reasons why the results of the elections in the affected local government areas were rejected and excluded from the overall results in the first place.
In his reaction, Kogi State governor, Yahaya Bello, said he accepted the decision of the Court of Appeal affirming Akpoti-Uduaghan as the duly elected candidate for the Kogi Central senatorial election held earlier in February.
Speaking with State House correspondents yesterday, Bello also congratulated Natasha, noting that this was the essence of democracy.
As a leader of the party in the state, he expressed his desire not to lose any seat.
He added that both Natasha and Abubakar Ohere are his siblings from the same senatorial zone.
He called on the people of Kogi Central to embrace the court’s decision.
He said, “At this moment, I accept the decision of the Appeal Court and I use this opportunity to congratulate my sister, Natasha, as a Senator of Kogi Central senatorial district”.
