The Bauchi State Governorship, National and State House of Assembly Elections Petition Tribunal, Thursday granted permission to the All Progressives Congress (APC) and its gubernatorial candidate, Air Marshal Sadique Baba Abubakar (retd) to inspect sensitive materials used by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in the just-concluded March 18 governorship election.
Ruling on an ex-parte application brought before the panel by the APC and Sadique, the tribunal, led by Justice F N Azinge, ruled that the application had merit and was granted accordingly.
Justice Azing ordered the electoral body to make available all the election materials used in the conduct of the governorship election to the applicants, their agents and counsel.
“The petitioners are to take certified copies and conduct a manual and physical inspection of all the electoral materials used in the conduct of the Bauchi governorship election held on the 18th March 2023,” said the judge.
The INEC Returning Officer, Professor Abdulkarim Mohammed of the Federal University Dutse, last Monday, declared that Governor Bala Abdulkadir Mohammed of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) was the winner of the election after “polling” 525,280 against the 432,272 votes secured by the APC’s Sadique.
But the complainants were not satisfied with the outcome of the polls. The party and its candidate through their counsel, Barrister Rilwan Jibrin approached the tribunal to challenge the result.
