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Tribunal affirms PDP’s Obanikoro winner of Tinubu’s LGA

The Lagos State Election Petition Tribunal on Thursday declared the candidate of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in last year’s local council polls, Ibrahim Babajide … Continue reading Tribunal affirms PDP’s Obanikoro winner of Tinubu’s LGA


The Lagos State Election Petition Tribunal on Thursday declared the candidate of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) in last year’s local council polls, Ibrahim Babajide Obanikoro, as the duly elected Chairman of the Ikoyi/Obalende Local Council Development Area (LCDA).

The state Local Government Election Petitions Tribunal nullified the declaration of the candidate of the ruling Action Congress of Nigeria (ACN), Adewale Adeniji, as winner of the election in the LCDA where the party’s national leader and former Lagos State governor, Bola Tinubu, resides and declared Mr Obanikoro the duly elected chairman for the area.

The five-man tribunal held that Mr Obanikoro, son of Nigeria’s former High Commissioner to Ghana, Musiliu Obanikoro won with 3,780 votes as against Mr Adeniji who scored 3,248 votes.

Justice Ojo, who read the judgment on behalf of the other members of the panel said that the respondents, the ACN and Mr Adeniji, “failed to rebut the burden of proof that was shifted on them by the quantum of evidence provided by the petitioners.”

He said: “Section 11(2) of the Local Government Elections Petitions Tribunal Law 2011 empowers this tribunal to nullify any election that does not comply with the laid down regulations.

“The petitioners have been able to discharge the burden of proof vested on them as regards to the collation of the results.

“It transferred the onus to the respondents who did not tender any LASIEC Form 9A, which is the first stage of any election.

“The petitioners have shown that the non-collation of the results at the units and ward levels substantially affected the outcome of the result declared by LASIEC.”

“We order LASIEC to issue a certificate of return to the petitioner with immediate effect having won the disputed election.

“We are also awarding N100, 000 as cost in favour of the petitioner,” the tribunal ordered.

According to the judge, the petitioner’s case was that there was no collation of results after elections had been held and this was undisputed by the Respondents.

The tribunal therefore concluded that it had the power to collate the results via the valid votes as entered into the appropriate LASIEC FORM 9A which is the only form acceptable for chairmanship results for local government elections in Lagos and the petitioners had brought same before the tribunal.

The judgment is coming about 11 months after the PDP and Mr Ibrahim Obanikoro filed the petition.