The Federal High Court in Abuja on Monday reserved judgment in a suit challenging the emergence of Sen. Sunday Karimi as the 2027 All Progressives Congress (APC)’s candidate for the Kogi West Senatorial District election.
Justice Salim Ibrahim adjourned the judgment to a date to be communicated to parties after listening to arguments from lawyers to parties in the suit filed by Aro Bamidele.
The suit, which has the APC, Karimi and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) as defendants, was initially filed in the Lokoja division of the Federal High Court, but later transferred to the Abuja division on grounds of insecurity.
The plaintiff, among others, prayed the court to declare him the winner of the primary election conducted on May 18.
He also urged the court to set aside APC’s subsequent submission of Karimi’s name to INEC as its candidate for next year’s senatorial election in Kogi West.
In their arguments on Monday, John Olusola Baiyeshea, SAN, for Karimi; Dayo Akinlaja, SAN, for INEC and A. G. Ivom for the APC, faulted the competence of the suit and urged the court to dismiss it for being statute barred.
Baiyeshea argued that while the primary was held on May 18 and Karimi’s name submitted to INEC on June 29, the plaintiff waited to file his suit in late July, outside the 14 days allowed in Section 285(9) of the Constitution for the filing of pre-election cases.
He also argued that the current position of the law is that it is the date of an event that counts and not the date the plaintiff became aware.
He noted that in this case, it was the date of the primary that should count and not when Bamidele became aware that Karimi’s name was submitted to INEC.
Baiyeshea equally noted that in the plaintiff’s haste to compile results of the election, he even added part of the results scored by President Bola Tinubu in the presidential election in the senatorial district as part of his results on which he is relying on to lay claim to victory.
He drew the court’s attention to the fact that the names submitted by the plaintiff as ward agents were those for the House of Representatives primary and not that of the senatorial primary, claiming that the one submitted by the 2nd defendant (Karimi) were the authentic ones.
Baiyeshea told the court that the APC, in a document it filed, disowned the results being paraded by Bamidele.
“In their haste to compile results, they added the result of President Tinubu presidential election along with that of the senatorial primary.
“And, the party (APC) denied that it was their results.
“The party has disowned that results that the plaintiff is parading.
“The plaintiff used the name of ward agents used in the House of Representatives primary.
“The authentic result is as presented by the party. We got our results from the party,” he said.
Baiyeshea told the court that Bamidele withdrew from the process before the primary election was held.
“He announced on his social media handle that he has withdrawn from the process, days before the election.
“Having withdrawn from the process before the election, he stood no ground of winning the election,” Baiyeshea said.
Ivom, who spoke in a similar vein as Baiyeshea, added that there is no evidence that the plaintiff won the primary election.
The APC lawyer said the actual results of the primary were the ones compiled by the party that conducted the primary and not INEC that merely witnessed the exercise and wrote reports.
Plaintiff’s lawyer, Johnson Usman, SAN, faulted the arguments by defendants’ lawyers.
He argued that there are ample evidence, including the results his client got from INEC, to show that Bamidele won the election.
Usman argued that the inclusion of President Tinubu’s results in the results his client tendered in court was an error and was not fatal to the case.
He prayed the court to declare his client the winner and order INEC to publish Bamidele’s name as the APC’s candidate for the senatorial district.
