By Our Correspondent-
The Court Of Appeal sitting in Kaduna on Thursday upheld the decision of the Kaduna State governorship election petition tribunal for dismissing a motion seeking judicial recount of ballot papers at the pre-trial stage.
Alh. Isa Ashiru, the governorship candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in the match 9th governorship election had approached the Appeal to set aside the ruling of the tribunal which dismissed It application for vote recount during the pre-trial of it petition.
Delivering the Judgement, Justice Mukhtar Hussein who led a five Man panel, also knocks the tribunal for saying that the petitioners application for amendment of the motion seeking to narrow the votes recount exercise to only 12 local government areas instead of the 23 Local Government Areas.
He said, the ruling by the tribunal that the application by the petitioners (Ashiru and PDP) “does not constitute abuse of court process”, and therefore dismissed it.
On the recount of ballot papers, Justice Hussein held that the tribunal was right not to have granted the application because it was an attempt to decide judgment before the end of the trial at the pre-trial stage.
He however said, the petitioners have the right to order the tribunal to produce the papers and be recounting during the main trial and not at the pre-trial.
Recalled that the state Governorship Election Petition Tribunal had on May 28, struck out the petitioners motion seeking for recount of votes cast in the governorship elections in the state during the pre-trial stage.
Chairman of the Tribunal, Justice Ibrahim Bako, who ruled on the motion, said the tribunal had a timeline of only 180 days within which to complete its assignment and the Tribunal would not accommodate the motion seeking for the recount of votes at this stage.
He also refused the application for amendment of the motion seeking to narrow the votes recount exercise to only 12 local government areas.
The pettitioners had asked that votes for Kaduna North, Kaduna South, Igabi, Birnin Gwari, Giwa, Zaria, Sabon Gari, Makarfi, Kudan, Kubau, Soba and Ikara local government areas be recounted.