Court nullifies House of Reps-elect election, orders IGP to prosecute him for forgery

Less than three weeks to his inauguration at the House of Representatives, the joy of Christian Abah (Ado/Okpokwu/Ogbadibo Federal ‎Constituency) was cut short on Wednesday.
For forging an Ordinary National Diploma (OND) certificate in Accountancy from the Federal Polytechnic, Mubi, in 1985, Justice Adeniyi Ademola of a Federal High Court, Abuja, ordered the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to withdraw the Certificate of Return issued to him for the seat in the Lower Chamber‎ on the platform of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
He also ordered INEC to issue another Certificate of Return to Abah’s challenger, Hassan Saleh, and the Speaker of the incoming eighth House of Representatives to swear-in Saleh as member representing the federal constituency.
Justice Ademola equally ordered the Inspector-General of Police (IGP), Mr. Solomon Arase, to immediately commence prosecution of Abah for forgery and perjury.
He held that the allegation of certificate forgery levelled against Abah by Saleh, the plaintiff, was established to be true.
Justice Ademola said his findings revealed an earlier judgement of the National/State Assembly Election Petition Tribunal ‎sitting in Makurdi delivered on September 6, 2011, and a letter by the Registrar of the polytechnic, Mr. Suleiman Buba, affirmed that the certificate presented by Abah to INEC was forged.
Abah had earlier been declared unopposed and elected being the only candidate presented for the March 28, 2015 National Assembly election.
The cou‎rt declared all the votes that accrued to him in the PDP’s primary held on December 6, 2014 as wasted and also declared Saleh, who came second, as the winner of the primaries.