The State and National Assembly Elections Petitions Tribunal in Enugu State has affirmed the victory of Senator Ike Ekweremadu of the Peoples Democratic Party in February 23 general elections.
In a unanimous judgement delivered on Monday, the tribunal dismissed the petition brought by Mrs. Juliet Ibekaku-Nwagwu of the All Progressives Congress, as lacking in merit.
The Chairman of the tribunal, Justice Haruna Kereng, while reading the judgment, said that the petitioners completely failed to prove their allegations beyond reasonable doubt.
Kereng said that allegations of substantial non-compliance to the Electoral Act, thuggery, falsification of figures needed to be proven polling unit by polling unit.
He said that the witnesses from a few polling unit brought by the petitioners failed to demonstrate to the tribunal how the election figures were falsified.
He said that out of the 824 polling units, 81 wards and five Local Government Areas in the state, the petitioners were only able to present 16 witnesses with most of them presenting testimonies that were not convincing.
“INEC had declared Ekweremadu winner with 86,088 votes against 15,187 scored by Ibekaku-Nwagwu. It is the responsibility of the petitioners to bring their polling unit agents to demonstrate to us how over 70,000 votes will be deducted from the score of the first respondent to make them winners.
“They only presented witnesses in few polling units and wards,” he said.
“Having failed woefully to prove their allegations that the first respondent was not elected by a majority of lawful votes cast, we, therefore, affirm the election of the first respondent as winner of the election,” he declared.
Kereng awarded a cost of N750,000 against the petitioners.