The Supreme Court has affirmed the judgment of the Court of Appeal validating the nomination of Ekiti State Governor, Abiodun Oyebanji, as the All Progressives Congress (APC) candidate in the June 20 governorship election.
In a unanimous judgment delivered on Friday, a five-member panel of the apex court dismissed the appeal filed by APC governorship aspirant, Mrs. Abimbola Olawumi, describing it as lacking merit.
The court held that the appeal was incompetent and ruled that the reliefs sought by the appellant could not be granted.
Mrs. Olawumi had challenged the process that produced Oyebanji as the APC governorship candidate, alleging that she was unlawfully prevented from participating in the party’s primary election. She urged the court to nullify the outcome of the exercise.
Delivering the lead judgment, Justice Mohammed Idris upheld the objections raised against applications filed by the appellant on July 16 and July 23 to regularise her notice of appeal and her brief of arguments.
Justice Idris noted that the written address attached to the July 16 application was unsigned and exceeded the page limit prescribed under Order 4 Rule 1 of the Supreme Court Rules. Consequently, the court struck out both applications and their accompanying written addresses.
The apex court also ruled that the first three grounds of appeal were incompetent because they did not arise from the judgment of the Court of Appeal. As a result, the issues formulated from those grounds were equally struck out.
On the remaining grounds, the Supreme Court held that the Court of Appeal was right to declare Mrs. Olawumi’s brief incompetent despite her pending application for regularisation.
The court further upheld the appellate court’s refusal to exercise its powers under Section 15 of the Court of Appeal Act to hear the originating summons, noting that the Federal High Court had already ruled the suit was statute-barred.
Justice Idris also held that the Supreme Court could not invoke its powers under Section 22 of the Supreme Court Act to determine the substantive suit because the constitutional 180-day time limit for hearing and deciding pre-election matters had expired.
The judgment effectively brings to an end the legal challenge against Governor Oyebanji’s nomination as the APC candidate.
