A Court of Appeal sitting in Abuja has declared Natasha Akpoti of the People’s Democratic Party as the authentic winner of Kogi Central Senatorial district election.
The Court upheld the judgment of the Kogi State Senatorial Tribunal which on 6th September removed the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Abubakar Sadiku-Ohere, as winner of the Kogi State central senatorial election.
A three-member panel of the appellate court affirmed the judgment of the tribunal, after it dismissed Mr Sadiku-Ohere’ appeal for lacking in merit.
The appellant had failed to provide convincing evidence why the judgment of the tribunal should be set aside.
The appellate court, subsequently held that Natasha Akpoti-Uduaghan of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) having won the majority of lawful votes cast at the poll, is declared winner of the Kogi State Central Senatorial District poll.
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had declared Mr Sadiku-Ohere of the APC winner of the senatorial election.
Dissatisfied, Mrs Akpoti-Uduaghan had appealed the declaration on grounds that INEC failed to input results from Ajaokuta, Adavi and Okehi Local Government Areas, whose votes gave her the lead above Mr 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 votes cast at the poll.
The appellate court in rejecting the APC candidate appeal held that INEC which has the duty of conducting and collating results failed to provide reasons why the results of the elections in the affected local governments areas were rejected and excluded from the overall results.
