The Supreme Court on Monday upheld the judgments of the election petitions tribunal and the Court of Appeal, affirming the mandate of Governor Hyacinth Aliya as the duly elected governor of Benue State.
The appeal by the Peoples Democratic Party and its candidate in the Benue governorship election, Titus Uba, was dismissed.
The apex court also affirmed the election of the priest-turned-politician.
This decision followed the withdrawal of an appeal by the counsel for Titus Uba of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Sebastian Hon.
Background:
Rev. Fr. Hyacinth Alia, the gubernatorial candidate of the All Progressive Congress (APC) in Benue state, was declared the winner of the state governorship elections by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) last year.
The APC candidate defeated his closest rival, Mr. Titus Uba of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), who came a distant second, with a margin of 251,020 votes.
Despite the pending election in Kwande LGA, Professor Farouk Kuta, the State Returning Officer, relied on the provisions of section 24(1) of the Electoral Act 2022 and the Electoral Guideline of INEC to declare the result of the election.
A breakdown of the result showed that the APC won in 17 Local Government Areas (LGAs) of the 23 LGAs of the state, PDP took four LGAs, while LP took one LGA.
The total valid votes stood at 756,903, the total votes cast was 768,404, and the total rejected votes in the election were 11,499.
The following legal battle:
There has been a legal battle between Hyacinth Alia of the All Progressives Congress (APC) and his rival in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) after the March 18, 2023 election.
The PDP candidate rejected the result and took it to the tribunal, where Justice Ibrahim Karaye-led three-man panel of the state tribunal sitting in Makurdi dismissed his petition for lack of jurisdiction.
Unsatisfied, Titus Uba appealed, and a three-man panel of justices at the Court of Appeal dismissed his appeal as lacking in merit, upholding the judgment of the Benue State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal.
However, the PDP and its candidate sought redress at the Supreme Court before subsequently withdrawing the case.