JUST-IN: Tribunal Dismisses PDP’s Petition, Affirms Alia As Benue Gov  

Benue State Governorship Election Petitions Tribunal sitting in Makurdi, has upheld the election of Governor Hyacinth Alia of the All Progressives Congress (APC).

The petition of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its governorship candidate, Titus Uba, who challenged the March 18 election, was dismissed for lack of jurisdiction to entertain the matter.

Chairman of the three-man panel of Justices, Justice Ibrahim Karaye, held that the Tribunal has no jurisdiction to entertain the petition as the matters raised before the Tribunal were pre-election issues as captured in section 285 of the Electoral Act.

According to the Tribunal, the petitioner ought to have pursued its case of non-qualification and the nomination of Governor Alia by the APC and the allegation of forged certificate and false information on form EC9 against his deputy, Sam Ode, before the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), beyond the Federal High Court which dismissed the earlier suit filed by the petitioner to the Court of Appeal and not the tribunal.

LEADERSHIP reported that Alia, a Catholic priest, scored 473,933 votes ahead of his closest rival Uba, who scored 223,913.