On Friday, a Federal High Court in Abuja dismissed a Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) suit seeking to disqualify Rev. Father Hyacint Alia as All Progressives Congress (APC) governorship candidate in Benue.
In a decision, Justice Inyang Ekwo ruled that the PDP’s suit was incompetent due to a lack of locus standi (legal standing) to bring the case.
According to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN), two plaintiffs, the PDP and Rt. Hon. Titus Uba, sued the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and the All Progressives Congress (APC) as the first and second defendants.
Rev. Father Alia, Mr Isaac Vembe, and Mr Samuel Ode were also named as defendants in the FHC/ABJ/CS/1556/2022 lawsuit.
The plaintiffs accused the APC of replacing the party’s deputy governorship candidate, Mr Vembe (4th defendant), with Mr Ode (5th defendant), without any written communication from the party to INEC to convey Vembe’s withdrawal as required by Section 31 of the Electoral Act, 2022.
They said the act also contravened sections 187 (1) and 285 (14) (c) of the 1999 Constitution (as amended) and INEC’s relevant timetable, regulations and guidelines.
The plaintiffs, who sought five reliefs, prayed for an order directing the electoral umpire not to recognise Alia as APC governorship candidate in the March 11 Benue poll.
They argued that Alia can neither nominate concurrently two deputy governorship candidates for the election nor was he competent to contest without any deputy governorship candidate since the time for doing so had elapsed.
Delivering the judgment, Justice Ekwo held that the provision of Section 285 (14) (c) of the 1999 Constitution which the plaintiffs relied on as giving them the locus stand in the case was taken out of context.
According to him, there is no word or phrase therein that gives any political party like the 1st plaintiff (PDP) or the 2nd plaintiff (Uba), as an individual, locus stand to challenge the activity or candidate of another political party.
The judge agreed with the 2nd, 3rd and 5th defendants that the subject matter of the suit was exclusively an internal affair of the APC.
“It is quite obvious that the provision of Section 29 (5) of the Electoral Act, 2022 which the plaintiffs sought refuge, has made it so.
“By giving locus standi only to ‘an aspirant’ who participated in the primaries of his political party to file a suit,” he said.
The judge, who also dismissed the suit for being an abuse of court process, agreed with the 2nd, 3rd and 5th defendants that similar suit had been brought before by the PDP against INEC, APC and others where it challenged the substitution of the APC vice-presidential candidate in suit number: FHC/ABJ/CS/1016/2022 which was determined on Sept 19, 2022.
“The judgment is subsisting, valid, unchallenged and binding,” Justice Ekwo said. (NAN)