Nigeria 2015 Polls: Jonathan eligible to contest —Appeal Court

THE Court of Appeal, Abuja, on Tuesday, dismissed an appeal challenging the eligibility of President Goodluck Jonathan to contest the March 28 presidential election.

 

The appellant, Cyriacus Njoku, had appealed the judgment delivered by Justice Mudashiru Oniyangi (as he then was) of an Abuja High Court that dismissed his suit challenging the eligibility of President Jonathan to contest the forthcoming presidential election for lacking in merit.

A panel of five justices of the appellate court, headed by Justice Abubakar Yahaya, in an unanimous judgment delivered on Tuesday held that the appellant’s suit was speculative and imaginary.

The court held that President Jonathan was qualified to contest the office of the president of the country in the forthcoming election.

Justice Yahaya said President Jonathan’s second term tenure would not end on May 29, because his first tenure of office started in 2011, when he took the oath of office and allegiance as an elected president of the country.

The judge said it was not an election that produced Jonathan as president in May 2010 and that the oath of office could not have been the oath of an elected president, adding also that the process that brought President Jonathan in 2010 was not an electoral process, but constitutional provisions.

“The appeal lacks merit and it is, hereby, dismissed. A cost of N50, 000 is, hereby, awarded against the appellant,” the court said and upheld the judgment of the trial court delivered on March 1, 2013.

Njoku had approached an Abuja High Court through his lawyer, Chief Okoi Obono-Obla, with a suit seeking a declaration that the tenure of office as president of Jonathan, the first defendant, began on May 6, 2010, when his first term began and his two terms shall end on May 29, 2015 after taking his second oath on May 29, 2011.

He also urged the court to stop Jonathan from further contesting or attempting to vie for the office of the president of Nigeria.

...NigerianTribune