Abia Tribunal strikes out APC’s petition against Ikpeazu

The Governorship Election Petition Tribunal in Umuahia has strike out the petition filed by Chief Nyerere Anyim, the governorship candidate of APC, challenging the election of Governor Okezie Ikpeazu.
Delivering judgement in the petition on Tuesday, the Chairman of the tribunal, Justice Usman Bwala, struck out the petition “for negligence and lack of diligence’’ in the prosecution by the petitioners.
Bwala also said that the petitioners failed to comply with the relevant sections of the Electoral Act in prosecuting their matter.
Messrs Adegboyega Awolomo, Henry Balogu and Livy Uzoukwu, who were counsel to Ikpeazu, PDP, and INEC, respectively had urged the tribunal to dismiss the petition because of the absence of the petitioners at the tribunal.
In their separate submissions, they said that neither the petitioners nor their counsels were in the tribunal and could not write to explain reasons for their absence.
Uzoukwu, while citing some relevant portions of the Electoral Act, urged the tribunal to apply the mandatory provisions of the law.
He said that the Act “mandated the tribunal to dismiss the petition because the petitioners failed to appear for the matter’’.
In his submission, Balogu said that the petitioners and their counsel were present at the last sitting of the tribunal and “were quite aware of today’s sitting but deliberately chose to be absent’’.
They urged the tribunal to strike the matter out, saying that the petitioners had lost interest in the matter.
The chairman of the tribunal later struck out the petition, saying that the petitioners failed to comply with relevant sections of the law to prosecute their petition.