Okowa defeats Ogboru, APC at tribunal

Delta State Governor Ifeanyi Okowa has defeated Great Ogboru and his All Progressives Congress (APC) party at the tribunal.

Ogboru, the governorship candidate of the APC in the March 9 gubernatorial election and his party had challenged Okowa’s victory at the Governorship Election Petitions Tribunal in Asaba, the Delta State capital.

In its ruling on Friday, the tribunal dismissed the petition filled by Ogboru and APC and affirmed Okowa of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as the duly elected governor of Delta state.

The chairman of the tribunal, Justice Sulaiman Belgore dismissed all the grounds of the petition. According to him, the petitioners failed to prove their case beyond reasonable doubts as required by law.

“The petition was badly drafted, devoid of details and insufficient data. The case of the petitioner remains unproven”.

Justice Belgore in his ruling said that due to inadequate data given by the counsel of the petitioner, it was wrong to contest that the first respondent, Okowa did not have a majority of lawful votes in the 2019 governorship poll.

He said, “Of 896 polling units in which over voting was recorded, the petitioner only brought five party agents as witnesses as other 15 witnesses were ward or collation agents” he said.