Court nullifies Alex Otti’s candidature, all LP candidates in Abia, Kano

A Federal High Court in Kano State, Friday, nullified the candidature of the Abia State Governor-elect, Mr Alex Otti, ten days before his inauguration as governor.

Otti, the candidate of the Labour Party (LP) in the March 18 governorship election in the state, was declared winner of the exercise by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) on 22 March.

The judge, M. N. Yunusa, also nullified the candidatures of all those who contested the 2023 general elections on the LP platform in Abia and Kano States, the Guardian newspaper reported.

The court ruled that the emergence of the candidates was not in compliance with the provisions of the 2022 Electoral Act.

The court in suit no: FHC/KN/CS/107/2023 was filed by Haruna Ibrahim against the LP and the INEC.

It ruled that the failure of the LP to submit its membership register to the INEC within 30 days before their primaries renders the process null and void.

“The party that has not complied with the provisions of the electoral act cannot be said to have candidates in an election and cannot be declared winner of an election.

“This being so, the votes credited to the 1st defendant (LP) is a wasted vote,” the judge ruled.

The Abia governor-elect and others affected are expected to appeal the judgement.

Otti won 10 of the 17 local government areas in the state to win the governorship election after polling a total of 175,467 votes.

His Peoples Democratic Party counterpart, Okey Ahiwe, polled 88,529 votes, while Enyinnaya Nwafor of the Young Peoples Party came in third with 28,972 votes.