by Christiana Gokyo, Jos
The Plateau State Election Tribunal, sitting in Jos High Court 6, has upheld the election of Sen. Simon Mwadkon as duly elected Senator for Plateau North Senatorial District and dismissed the petition brought before it against Barr Gyang Yahaya Zi.
Declaring the judgment on Thursday by Justice Mohammed Mohammed of the 3-man Committee of the Tribunal, he said, those witnesses that came to testify and to prove alleged voting, were not coming from the polling units.
Barr Gyang Yahaya Zi, who contested under the Labour Party (LP), had challenged INEC for declaring Hon. Simon Mwadkon of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) winner for Plateau North Senatorial seat.
The tribunal dismissed the petition of Gyang Zi of lacking in merit to institute a suit on over-voting, non-compliance to 2022 Electoral Act because those witnesses were depending on just mire hearsay.
The Labour Party was in tribunal on three grounds of no structure, by the 3rd respondent, to nominate and sponsor the 2nd respondent; but the court dismissed that, because it was a pre-election matter, which the Federal High Court should have entertained on jurisdiction; so, the tribunal declined venturing into issues of pre-election.
The Plateau North judgment was delivered by Hon. Justice Mohammed Mohammed and was unanimously agreed by the 3-man Panel.
The Tribunal had earlier upheld the election of Musa Avia Agah and dismissed the petition of Adamu Alkali of the People Redemption Party (PRP) for the National Houses of Assembly Election.
The Petition Tribunal said the Petition against Musa Avia Agah of the Peoples Democratic Party is lacking merits and incompetence, where the petitioner was unable to prove all his three grounds.
The judgment was declared by Justice William Rotimi Olamije, who is the Chairman of the 3-man Panel, affirming the victory of Musa Agah for scoring lawful votes cast in the 25/02/2023 general elections in Jos North/Bassa Federal Constituency seat.
On a unanimous judgment, all the jurists were in agreement to the position of the chairman of the trial tribunal, who delivered that PW3 – who is the witness- affirmed that he wasn’t a member of PDP, so he doesn’t have anything to do with the their affairs.
According to the judgment, the petitioner, Hon Adamu Muhammad Alkali of Peoples Redemption Party (PRP), challenged the declaration of Musa Avia Agah of the PDP in Jos North/Bassa constituency seat.
He said, the petitioner could not prove the allegations of over-voting by not presenting BVAS Machine and Voters Register to prove his alleged ‘over-voting.’
