Relief as S/Court gives verdict on Rivers guber election

WITH last Wednesday’s unanimous verdict of the Supreme Court, which upturned the decision of the Appeal Court that had earlier ordered a repeat of the April 11, 2015 governorship election in Rivers State, a great sigh of relieve swept through the state.

Before the judgment, a thick pall of apprehension had hung heavily on the state, as residents feared the consequence of a repeat election that was ordered by the Appeal Court.

The fear of the residents were not misplaced as the controversial election was the most violent in the history of the state with many abductions and outright murder before, during and after the exercise.

Moments after the judgment was given in Abuja and news filtered into town, gunshots rang out at Chukwu Street off Tombia Extension in the New Government Reservation Area of Port Harcourt, the state capital, causing pandemonium among residents.

Although the sporadic gunshots were said to have been fired by those celebrating the judgment, a negative verdict could have led to violence by the gun-wielding hoodlums and those on the other side who probably could have responded violently.

The roots of the violence and cut-throat political rivalry between politicians in the state who are divided among the two major camps of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and All Progressive Congress (APC) are embedded in the power tussle between incumbent governor, Nyesom Wike his predecessor and former boss, Rotimi Amaechi, who is now the Minister of Transportation.

Wike, who was Amaechi’s Chief of Staff (COS) parted ways with the latter at the peak of the hostilities between Amaechi and President Goodluck Jonathan during the build-up to the 2015 general election that eventually culminated in Jonathan’s defeat.

As the Minister of State for Education with support of the Jonathan Presidency, Wike allegedly deployed all the state’s coercive instruments to intimidate Amaechi, a sitting governor, to the extent that on several occasions, the governor was prevented from even accessing the Government House.

An attempt by a handful of state legislators to have Amaechi illegally impeached turned bloody inside the chambers and for months after the incident, the gates of the House of Assembly Complex was locked up thereby depriving the government of legislative contributions.

It was under this rancorous atmosphere that the election was held and because two weeks earlier on March 28, the PDP had lost federal power through Jonathan’s defeat, it became more important for the party to retain Rivers State while the APC, buoyed by its victory at the centre, wanted to add the state to its trophies.

In the results declared by the Returning Officer, Faraday Osasere Oruwase, a Professor and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Benin, Wike polled 1,029,102 or 87.7 percent of total votes cast while his major rival, Dakuku Peterside of the APC scored 124,896 or 10.65 percent of the 1,172,535 valid votes recorded.

But Peterside cried foul and approached the Election Petition Tribunal to prove cases of widespread violence, voter intimidation and other electoral malpractices claiming that “materials were hijacked in many local government areas even before accreditation started and election did not hold in many areas too.

“In Akuku Toru Local Government Area, electoral materials were hijacked and INEC officials between up by heavily armed men who would not allow election to be conducted in the area. Even in areas where they managed to conduct the election, results were written in the homes of PDP chieftains.”

In a judgment that was upheld by the Appeal Court, the tribunal found merits in Dakuku’s petition, cancelled the April 11 exercise and ordered a rerun of the election.

Wike however, approached the Supreme Court to seek proper interpretation of the issues that led to the lower courts cancellation of his election, which, according to his lawyers, cannot stand the test of adequate legal scrutiny given conflicting decisions taken by other courts on similar issues.

One of the issues on which the election was annulled was that the exercise did not fully complied with the guidelines of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) by non-observance of the commission’s directive on the use of card reader device.

One of the counsels to Wike, Ifedayo Adedipe, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) had told The Guardian earlier that “the judgment of the Rivers State election petition tribunal is faulty and the basis for that judgment would be surely tested at the appellate levels.

“I do not think that it is right to annul a state election on the basis that INEC directives, were not complied with. I would have thought that the election should have been annulled if the Electoral Act was violated. Directives are directives and the Electoral Act made it abundantly clear that the non-observance of directives of INEC will not on itself, be a ground for annulling or questioning of an election.

“The court of appeal in Agbaje and Ambode made it clear that the usage of card reader, though a beautiful innovation, has no legal basis as the card reader itself is an innovation by INEC and INEC is not a legislative body. Do recall that there is no legislation backing this issue of card reader. So to use that as a basis for annulling an election probably needs a review or an approval by the appellate court. So for now, I do not agree with the verdict of the Rivers State Election Petition Tribunal.

“Section 138 (2) of the Electoral Act says that directives are not part of the law of INEC. And when you look at Section 149 of the Electoral Act, which is the one dealing with accreditation, there is no role for the card reader there. So to say that an election is annulled because of card reader is not right.”

The apex court, presided over by the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Justice Mahmud Muhammed, disagreed with the lower courts and declared that Wike is the winner of the election bringing relieve to residents that peace that had eluded the communities for a long time, would at least, reigned in the land.