Barely twenty four hours to the planned swearing in of the declared winner of the Bayelsa governorship election – APC’s David Lyon, has the Supreme Court nullified his nomination on grounds that he was not validly elected.
The judgement is a fallout of the appeal filed by the Peoples Democratic Party and its Bayelsa governorship candidate Senator Duoye Diri challenging the candidacy of Biobarakuma Degi Eremienyo on grounds that he submitted false information in his nomination forms to INEC.
A judge of the Federal High Court, Justice Inyang Ekwo had sacked the APC deputy candidate few days to the November 2019 election. The judge had ruled that Degi Eremienyo actually lied in his documents submitted to INEC.
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However, the judgement was later upturned by the court of appeal.
But the Supreme Court on Thursday upheld the findings of Justice Inyang Ekwo and set aside the decision of the court of appeal.
Reading the lead judgement, Justice Ejembi Eko maintained that the APC deputy candidate falsified his information in his nomination form.
Having established that the deputy was not validly nominated, the immediate implication was that the APC did not have any valid nomination in the Bayelsa governorship election, since the constitution requires that a candidate for the position of governor must have a running mate.
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Consequently the Supreme Court ordered that the candidate with the second highest votes be sworn immediately.
The Peoples Democratic Party candidate Senator Duoye Diri who came second in the election and is also the appellant in the appeal is expected to be sworn in as the governor of Bayelsa state.
After the judgement, lawyers for the appellant were seen frantically trying to obtain the enrolled order to serve on inec for the issuance of a certificate of return
