Supreme Court Affirms PDP’s Ademola Adeleke as Validly Elected Governor of Osun State
By Alabidun Shuaib AbdulRahman
The Supreme Court has affirmed Ademola Adeleke of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as the validly elected Governor of Osun State, dismissing an appeal lodged against his election victory by the former governor of the state, Adegboyega Oyetola, who was the gubernatorial candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
In its lead judgement delivered by Justice Emmanuel Agim, the apex court held that although Oyetola alleged that Adeleke won through over-voting that occurred in 774 polling units in the state, he failed to produce any Bimodal Voters Accreditation System (BVAS), a machine that was used in any of the polling units to prove his allegation.
The Supreme Court held that since it was not in dispute that the BVAS contained a record of accredited voters, “it is, therefore, the only direct and primary record of voters accredited at polling units on election day.”
It held that nothing in either Section 47 of the Electoral Act 2022 or Regulations 18-23 of the Independent National Electoral Commission’s (INEC) Regulations made it mandatory for presiding officers in an election to transmit by BVAS the number of accredited voters in each polling unit to the backend server.
The apex court dismissed evidence of purported expert witnesses that testified in Oyetola’s favour.
The Osun State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal had earlier voided the declaration of Adeleke of the PDP as the winner of the gubernatorial election in a split decision on January 27.
The majority verdict upheld a petition that was brought before it by Oyetola of the APC, who came second in the election, stating that Adeleke did not score the majority of lawful votes and that the conduct of the election was not in substantial compliance with provisions of the Electoral Act, 2022.
However, the third member of the panel, Justice P. Ogbuli, affirmed Adeleke as the valid winner of the election and struck out the petition that was lodged by Oyetola and the APC.
Following an appeal lodged by Adeleke and the PDP, the Court of Appeal reversed the judgment of the tribunal on March 24, awarding a cost of N500,000 against the APC and its candidate, Gboyega Oyetola.
Dissatisfied with the judgement, both Oyetola and the APC took the matter before the Supreme Court where they also lost on Tuesday.
