The Election Petition Tribunal sitting as Panel 1, Metro Road, Uyo, on Tuesday dismissed an application by the APC House of Assembly candidate in the last House of Assembly election in Essien Udim, Mr. Nse Ntuen who prayed the court to strike out the petition filed against him, Igbere TV reports.
In his application, Nse Ntuen, through his lawyers, prayed the court to dismiss the petition arguing that the application for the pre-hearing session was not made by Esse Gerald Umoh’s lawyers within the mandatory 7 day period.
On being served with the application, Ekemini Udim, Counsel for the PDP and Esse Gerald Umoh opposed the application and prayed the court to dismiss same and continue with the hearing of the matter.
When the matter last came up for adoption of counsel’s addresses, Adesanya, SAN who appeared with Patrick Umoh for Nse Ntuen, argued the application for close to an hour and urged the court to dismiss the petition.
In his submission, Ekemini Udim drew the attention of the Court to fact that the position canvassed by the learned SAN had been overtaken by recent decisions of the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court on the subject matter. He urged the court to dismiss the submissions of the SAN and follow the recent position of the law. He cited several decided authorities to support his argument.
When asked by the Chairman of the Tribunal whether cost should be awarded against the applicant, Ekemini Udim responded that he would not like to ask for cost in a matter in which his senior colleague, a SAN, is the lead counsel on the other side. He urged the court not to award cost.
In a well considered ruling of the Tribunal delivered by Justice A. W. Akanbi, the court followed the new position of the law on the subject matter as canvassed by counsel to Esse Gerald Umoh and arrived at the judicial conclusion that the application for pre-hearing which was filed within four of the seven days required by law was filed within time and therefore competent.
Legal analysts say even if the ruling had succeeded and the petition dismissed, the court would not have made an order declaring Nse Ntuen as the winner of the Essien Udim State Constituency election. He has not made any counter claim to be declared winner of the election neither has he attached any evidence that he was declared winner in the reply he has presented to the Tribunal. This according to analysts implies that even if the petition was dismissed as he wanted, the dismissal would not have even favoured him.
Patrick Umoh was in court with Idio, Esq for Nse Ntuen while Ekemini Udim appeared with Beulah Udechukwu for Esse Umoh and PDP.
