Edo Assembly LP Candidate, Uhunmwagho Petitions Judicial Council Over Tribunal’s Ruling Upholding Opponent’s Victory

A Labour Party candidate for the Edo State House of Assembly election, Derrick Uhunmwago has written a petition against the election tribunal that upheld his loss in the March election before the National Judicial Council.

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) declared Osawaru Irobosa of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as the winner after the election held on March 18, 2023, and the supplementary poll held on April 15, about a month later.

Mr Irobosa, according to INEC results, received 12,436 votes, while the Labour Party’s Mr Uhumwago, coming closest as the first runner-up, got 11,245 votes. The other nine candidates who participated in the election got tiny fractions of the total votes cast.

Mr Uhumwago, on the other hand, claimed he won the election and that the extra poll was invalid.

He pleaded with the judiciary in Benin, the state capital, to declare him the winner and award him the certificate of return.

At the end of the March 18, election, he claimed to have received 10,990 votes while the PDP candidate received 5,578 votes, only for INEC to declare the result inconclusive.

He stated that INEC declared the election inconclusive because “the election had not been validly and successfully conducted in Ward 4.”

He denied INEC’s assertion, saying the election was duly conducted in the said ward and the unit results were given to the petitioners’ agents at the Polling Units. Hence, Uhumwago approached the election tribunal for possible redress by filing a petition to seek the nullification of Mr Irobosa’s result.

However, the tribunal made up of two judges simply identified as Justice Chijioke El-Mainari and Alero Akeredolu unanimously agreed that Uhumwago’s petition lacked merit.

In response, Uhumwago told SaharaReporters that the tribunal was biased, revealing that the decision was based on the opinion of a single member of the panel, with the lead judge offering a ‘grossly ambiguous opinion, leaving him highly prejudiced by this rather awkward decision’.

In his petition obtained by SaharaReporters, he said: “On his part, Prof. Alero Akeredolu wholly neglected his responsibility by failing to render any judgment whatsoever despite having participated in the proceedings.

“The combination of the conduct of the panel denied me an opportunity to be fairly heard in this matter. The unjudicial conduct has further robbed my constituents of the mandate that they delivered to me in the election of March 18, 2023 and April 15, 2023.

“If I was fairly heard, I would have accepted the outcome of the judgement of the panel without any fuss. However, dismissing my Petition for the unjudicial conduct of the panel has wrought grave injustice on me.”

“In view of the foregoing, I urge you to use your good offices to investigate my petition against the panel to unravel the reasons for their Lordships unjudicial conduct and apply any application sanctions for this action,” Uhumwago told the National Judicial Council.

The petition further reads: “On March 18, 2023, INEC organized general elections covering various political offices, including Egor State Constituency in the Edo State House of Assembly.

“The Edo State House of Assembly election for Egor State Constituency was conducted mostly successfully, with result collation being completed in 9 out of the said 10 wards. However, there was a disturbance at the collation center of Ward 4. Nevertheless, before the disruption occurred, the results of Ward 4 had already been compiled into Form EC8B(I) by the INEC officials.

“Following collation, INEC announced results from only 9 out of the 10 wards and intentionally omitted the results from Ward 4, even though same had been properly compiled. According to the announced results from the 9 wards, I led with a total of 10,990 votes while one Osawaru Natasha Irobosa, sponsored by the PDP, secured the second-highest votes, with a total of 5,578.

“While collating ward results at the Local Government Collation Centre, the Local Government Collation Officer for the state constituency claimed that there were no results from Ward 4.

“Notwithstanding the fact that the election had been concluded and elections results had been announced at the polling units. The Collation Officer ultimately canceled Ward 4 on the ostensible ground that there was violence at the Collation Centre.

“I formally requested Certified True Copies of the electoral materials for the Egor State Constituency Election. INEC received this application on April 3, 2023, and provided several documents, including the CTC of Form EC 8B (1), containing the collated results of all polling units in Ward 4 EGOR registration area. I also received Form EC 8C (1), a summary of all 10 wards excluding Ward 4. The CTC of Form EC 8B (1) as well as the CTC of Form EC 8C (1) shall form part of the accompanying documents to this Petition.

“Based on the results revealed by INEC (Form EC8B (1), which includes the results from the allegedly canceled Ward 4, I garnered a total of 497 valid votes, while the PDP candidate secured 1,410 votes. According to the Form EC8B (1) dated March 18, 2023, signed by Prof. Ugiagbe Ezekiel on behalf of INEC and duly certified, an election took place in Ward 4, EGOR L.G.A on March 18, 2023.

“By adding the votes from Ward 4, as indicated on Form EC8B (1) dated March 18, 2023, to the votes of the Petitioner and the PDP candidate in the EC8C (1) of March 18, 2023, the total votes for each party are as follows:

“i. Derick Uhunmwangho (LP) 10,990+497 = 11,487 ii. Osawaru Natasha Irobosa (PDP) 5,578 +1,410 = 6,988.”