The Lagos State Governorship Election Tribunal has dismissed the Labour Party and its candidate, Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour, from his Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) counterpart, Olajide Adediran, commonly known as Jandor,’s appeal challenging the 2016 governorship election.
Jandor is opposing the re-election of Babajide SanwoOlu and Obafemi Hamzat in the Lagos State governorship election on March 18.
The Chairman of the tribunal, Justice Arum Ashom, announced shortly after the announcement of appearances by all lawyers and parties in the case at Monday’s proceeding that the court would first deliver judgment in the case of the PDP & its candidate before giving its judgment in the petition of the Labour Party’s governorship candidate, Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour.
Justice Ashom also gave the floor to his brother, Justice Mikail Abdullahi, to read the panel’s decision.
Justice Igho Braimoh is the panel’s third judge.
In its decision, read by Justice Abdullahi, the tribunal first addressed the parties’ preliminary objections.
The first argument raised is whether the third respondent, Obafemi Hamzat, Deputy Governor of Lagos, is a different and distinct candidate from the second respondent, Babajide Sanwo-Olu. In addition, the tribunal was requested to rule on whether the deputy governor could be named as a respondent in the case.
The Tribunal noted that this question has been handled in a number of cases before concluding that a deputy governor and governor are not separate candidates and do not require a separate security deposit.
The tribunal was questioned in the second objection if a person who lost an election might be added as a respondent in an election petition.
Jandor had joined Labour Party Candidate Rhodes-Vivour as a respondent in his petition. The panel agreed, citing a series of previous decisions, that a petition should be filed between the winner and loser of an election, not between two people who lost.
As a result, the tribunal upheld the preliminary objection and struck out the name of the 5th respondent, Rhodes-Vivour, from Jandor’s petition. The tribunal likewise removed from its records all exhibits offered in evidence by Rhodes-Vivour in Jandor’s petition.
The panel went on to rule that Rhodes-Vivour cannot later appeal any element of the Jandor’s petition verdict or he will be considered a meddling invader.
Similarly, the Tribunal ruled that the 6th respondent, the Labour Party, should not have been named as a respondent in Jandor & the PDP’s petition. The name of the party was afterwards struck out for being incorrectly joined. All evidence and exhibits pertaining to the party were likewise removed from the tribunal’s files.
The Tribunal, however, rejected the APC’s and its candidate’s contentions that the LP’s and its candidate’s misjoinder constituted grounds for dismissing the petition.
The tribunal held, “That the 5th & 6th respondent ought not to have been made respondents to the petition cannot rob the tribunal of the jurisdiction to hear the parties. The question of misjoinder cannot lead to a striking out of the petition as the proper order to make is to strike out the names of the parties”.
“Already the name of the 5th respondent has been struck out and the 6th respondent who has been found to be improperly joined is also ordered to be struck out” .
Hearing of the judgment is still underway as of the time of filing this report.
