Osun Governor-elect, Sen. Ademola Adeleke’s election as the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP candidate has been upheld by the Supreme Court.
Adeleke’s candidacy as that of PDP has been a subject of litigation due to his fierce rival for the main-opposition party’s ticket, Dotun Babayemi who approached the court seeking for invalidation of the PDP primary outcome on the grounds of non-compliance with electoral law.
The five-member panel, in a judgment delivered by Justice Amina Augie, held that the court lacked jurisdiction to hear the suit after counseling for the appellant, Adebayo Adelodun, SAN, withdrew the earlier notice of appeal that was filed within time.
Upon resumed hearing in the matter, Adelodun, who appeared for the appellant and a PDP governorship aspirant, Dotun Babayemi, informed that he sought to withdraw the earlier notice of appeal to replace it with the fresh application he filed.
But the panel held that Section 285(11) of the constitution stipulated that an appeal on a pre-election matter must be filed within 14 days from the day of the decision and that having filed the second appeal out of time, the apex court lacked jurisdiction to entertain the matter
Justice Augie, therefore, dismissed the appeal for lack of jurisdiction.
In his judgment on the matter on May 18, Justice Nathaniel Ayo-Emmanuel of a Federal High Court, sitting in Osogbo, had upheld the governorship primary that produced Adeleke.
Also, the Court of Appeal, Akure Division, in its judgment of July 20 on the appeal filed against the decision of the Federal High Court, Osogbo, aligned with the lower court and dismissed Babayemi’s appeal.
NAN
