* Ishaku 
               By Ibrahim Hamma, Abuja
 The ripples from the  judgment of  the Taraba State Governorship Election Tribunal​’s  is still  reverberating across   Taraba’s polity, the judiciary  and the Country at large.

The Tribunal in its ruling
* Alhassan 
on November 7, 2015  nullified the election of the State governor, Darius Ishaku on the grounds that he did not emerge as Peoples Democratic Party’s candidate via  valid primaries as required by the Electoral Act, 2010 and the 1999 Constitution.

Tribunal chairman,  Justice Musa Danladi Abubakar while delivering the judgment, ordered that the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Senator Aisha Alhassan, who scored the second highest votes, be declared the winner of the election, maintaining that it is within the purveyor of the Tribunal’s power to so do (Ishaku scored 369,318 votes to emerge victorious;  while Alhassan came second with 275,984 votes)

To put it mildly, the ruling knocked the PDP leadership dizzy, because they never anticipated such. As a matter of fact there are arguments that the PDP may  have failed to adequately  respond to the petitioner’s claims  that the PDP candidate did not emerge through a governorship primaries  in compliance with the Electoral Act, 2010.

The Tribunal’s judgment has since  became the talking point in the polity: Some argue from a partisan point of view, others from the judicial  implications

Perhaps the controversies invoked by the ruling would all  be addressed at the Court of Appeal or at the Supreme Court.

Among others, there are questions as to  whether INEC acted within the provisions of the law by making provisions for PDP to participate in the governorship elections and turning round to testify at the Tribunal that PDP had no candidate in the said election.

Other points of law would be the issues involved in the communications between the PDP and INEC for conducting of the governorship primary by the former. If indeed the security situation forced PDP to reschedule its governorship primary from Jalingo to Abuja, was INEC not taken into confidence?

Assuming  the Court of Appeal upholds the Tribunal’s judgment, the equally contentious issue of Alhassan meeting the legal requirements to be returned as validly elected governor of Taraba would be thrown up.

Alhassan did not secure two-thirds in two-thirds of the local government areas in Taraba – She won only in 6 of the 16 local government areas of the State.

The nearest judicial pronouncement similar to that of the Taraba guber Tribunal is that of 2007  Court of Appeal which removed Celestine Omehia as the Rivers State governor averring that Rotimi Amaechi, not he was  duly nominated by the PDP at its governorship primaries.

As expected both parties have taken different positions on the ruling:  The PDP argues  that the reason given by the Tribunal for arriving at what it described as its  ‘bizarre decision was intriguing and further exposes the contradictions and double standards inherent in most tribunal rulings against PDP interests recently’.

However, for the APC,  the judiciary displayed boldness and unfettered commitment to the sacred principles of honour, good conscience and truth, ‘Indeed, by the ruling, it has been proven that true democracy, sovereignty ultimately resides with the inviolable will of the people’.

However, the views of the  Ekiti State Governor, Ayodele Fayose, addressed  pointedly from both  partisan and judicial points of view stands out in bold lines.

Fayose submitted that the judgment smacks of  ‘judicial rascality and conspiracy’  which must be questioned by all and urged  the National Judicial Council, NJC to probe the  Tribunal​’s judgment.

Elucidating on his conspiracy theory, the no-nonsense Ekiti Governor maintained that INEC has lent itself as  part of the conspiracy. He  queried why the Commission never  raised any objection to  Ishaku’s participation in the election when his name was submitted as PDP candidate.

Playing up partisan sentiments, Fayose insinuated that there are serving governors and senators in this country, who took part in the APC presidential primary election, and after failing to pick the APC presidential ticket, their names surfaced as gubernatorial and senatorial candidates of APC in their respective States.

‘’Can INEC tell Nigerians when it took part in the process that produced those senators and governors as APC candidates?

“There are also those who left PDP to become APC candidates, can INEC tell Nigerians where the primary elections that produced them were held? He queried.

The Ekiti governors affirmed that the Taraba  judgment lends credence to suggestions  there were different laws being applied to similar cases by the election tribunals: One for the PDP and another for APC.

Fayose,  hinting  of ‘cash and carry judges’ that are daily giving tainted and contradictory judgments, insisted that “Those judges, who gave the Taraba State judgment, which is totally against the Electoral Act 2010 (as amended) and the one who took N15million bribe in Yobe State must be investigated by the NJC.”

If INEC’s evidence at the Tribunal formed the main ground for its judgment, one PDP governorship aspirant has proffered that the party  indeed conducted a governorship primary where Ishaku emerged.

 Ambassador Musa John, former Nigeria’s High Commissioner  to Trinidad and Tobago, faulted the Tribunal’s ruling, saying that, as a former PDP governorship aspirant, he was aware that the party primary, held in Abuja, where he actively participated, because  the security situation in Jalingo, could not guarantee the event being conducted  peacefully in there.

Ambassador John described as irony of sorts  that while  all the other aspirants that participated in the party primaries in Abuja never  objected  to the emergence of Ishaku, he wondered why the Tribunal took the decision.

‘’How can Alhassan emerge as governor when she did not satisfy the two-thirds majority votes requirement as enshrined in the 1999 Constitution,  the APC won in only five out of the 16 local government areas of Taraba’’ he averred.

 In his reaction,  the People’s Democratic Movement (PDM) candidate, in the said election, Alhaji Kabiru Dodo, said the judgment has potentials of creating anarchy as the people have already decided for Ishaku.

Similarly, former Nigerian Ambassdor to Cameroon, Mr. Emmanuel Njuwa, added  that Ishaku got the overwhelming votes of the people even when INEC called for a re-run in some local governments and wards after the main election was won by Ishaku.

Speaking to journalists  in Abuja, leaders of the various political divide in the State were unanimous that the judgment of the tribunal was capable of throwing the already volatile State into an unnecessary chaos, owing to the political sophistication of the people, who hardly give away their mandate anytime it was freely decided at the polls. Already, No fewer than eight people were killed and more than 30 others were injured in the crisis which erupted  in Wukari,  Taraba  State  as a result of the  verdict.


The Tribunal had maintained that there was overwhelming evidence that the PDP in Taraba sidelined the provisions of the Electoral Act 2010, and the 1999‎ Constitution, as amended, when it decided to hold the primary election that produced Ishaku as its candidate in Abuja instead of Jalingo, the State capital.

It held that the purported nomination of the governor for the election, without a valid primary election monitored by INEC, was in breach of Sections 85, 87 and 138(1) of the Electoral Act 2010, as well as Section 177 of the 1999 Constitution, as amended.

The Tribunal stressed that the governorship primary election, the PDP held at its National Headquarters in Abuja, on December 11, 2014, was not known to the law and was, therefore, invalid.

Besides, the tribunal noted that INEC ‎confirmed that it was not part of the primary election that produced Ishaku as the PDP candidate, saying Section 85 of the Electoral Act made it mandatory that PDP must give the electoral body 21 days notice before it could hold a convention or primary to nominate its governorship candidate.

Consequently, the tribunal held that, in view of the fact that Ishaku was not sponsored by any known registered political party in Nigeria, he could not lay claim to votes cast for any political party at the April 11 election nor could he claim that he took part in the poll as an independent candidate.

The APC and its candidate, Alhassan, had gone before the tribunal to challenge the victory of Ishaku of the PDP at the polls.
The petitioners prayed the tribunal to void the governorship poll for corrupt practices and substantial non-compliance with the provisions of the Electoral Act 2010, as amended.

The petitioners through their lead counsel, Mr. Abiodun Owonikoko, SAN, told the tribunal: “Contrary to the provisions of Section 85 of the Electoral Act, which requires the service of at least 21 days to INEC before the holding of congress for the conduct of primary election, the 2nd respondent (PDP) only delivered their notice to INEC on December 11, 2014, at exactly 6:04pm and held the purported primaries on the same day. This was apparently after they have conducted the said primary.

“That in defiance of the requirements of Section 87 of the Electoral Act, the 2nd respondent held the purported primary at Abuja as against Jalingo, Taraba State capital.

“That relying on their earlier notice to INEC for the holding of the primary at the Taraba State capital, INEC (3rd respondent) sent their monitoring team to observe the primary election on December 8, 2014, but the congress did not hold without any explanation from the party.

“That in flagrant disregard to the demands of the Electoral Act 2010, the 1st and 2nd respondents held their primary in Abuja without approval from INEC.

“That by reason of paragraphs i, ii, iii, and iv above, the 1st respondent was not duly sponsored by his political party as required under section 177(c) of the 1999 constitution nor duly sponsored, the 1st respondent is/was not qualified to have contested the gubernatorial election that held in Taraba State on April 11 and 25, 2015”.

All said and done, the above pronouncement by the Tribunal notwithstanding, the general consensus is that since PDP participated in the election, apparently without a candidate as suggested above,  and since  the Electoral Act, allocates votes to  the party, and not candidates,  it would have been logical for the election to be cancelled outright, and another election scheduled for the State

Additionally, Taraba people obviously voted for the PDP, and not for the APC which even after the re-run of April 25, still failed to garner the constitutionally required two-thirds majority, would it not be a negation of the will of the majority to award the governorship to the party voted for by the minority?



Hamma is an Abuja-based Journalist and Public Affairs Commentator