The Federal High Court sitting in Abuja, on Thursday, declined to disqualify Osun State Governor, Adegboyega Oyetola, from participating in the Saturday governorship election in the state on the platform of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), IgbereTV reports
The presiding judge, Justice Inyang Ekwo who delivered the verdict in a suit filed by a chieftain of the party in the state, Moshood Adeoti, said the plaintiff failed to establish a reasonable cause of action to warrant Oyetola’s disqualification from the election.
Adeoti had filed the suit seeking the court to invalidate Oyetola’s nomination as flag-bearer of the APC for the election, but in his judgement, Ekwo said the suit lacked merit and deserved to be dismissed.
In the originating summons, Adeoti who had also contested the primary election that declared Oyeyola as the party’s candidate, had prayed the court to nullify Oyetola’s candidacy on the grounds that the governor contested in the February 19 primary election as a member of the APC’s National Caretaker Extraordinary and Convention Planning Committee (CECPC).
The summons had also sought Oyetola’s disqualification on the grounds that by not resigning from the CECPC, he had contravened the provisions of Section 222 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended) and Article 31(iii) of the APC, October 2014 (as amended).
But in dismissing the suit, the judge held that CECPC is not an office recognized by the APC’s Constitution upon which anybody can be disqualified but a mere ad-hoc body put in place in the absence of the National Executive Committee known to law
