The Supreme Court has dismissed an appeal filed by a former Minister of State for Education, Chukwuemeka Nwajiuba, seeking to disqualify Bola Tinubu as the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress, APC.
Justice John Okoro who led a five-man panel, while ruling on the appeal, dismissed the suit on the ground that it was statute-barred, having been filed out of time.
Nwajiuba and a civil group, the Rights for All International, a non-governmental organisation, were challenging Tinubu’s nomination, on the grounds that he did not disclose the source of the 100,000,000.00 which he paid to obtain the nomination and expression of interest form, in contravention of Section 90 (3) of the Electoral Act, 2022, and that the APC did not comply with the Federal Character principle, in the composition of the national working committee.
The appellant had lost at the Federal High Court and the Court of Appeal, both in Abuja, on the same ground, that his case lacked merit.
The Abuja Federal High Court had dismissed the suit on the ground that it lacked jurisdiction to entertain the suit, as the suit was filed outside the statutorily mandated and allowed period of 14 days.
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The appellate court relied on the decision of the trial court, in dismissing the suit, awarding a cost of N3 million against him.
The Apex Court in their decision on Thursday, while pointing out that the concurrent findings of the two courts cannot be disturbed.
He urged the appellant to withdraw the appeal.
(Editor: Ifeanyi Mark)
