Headlines
Supreme Court Affirms Makinde, Sanwo-Olu, El-Rufai, Five Others’ Elections
The Supreme Court on Wednesday validated the election of Governor Oluseyi Makinde of Oyo State and the victories of the governors of seven other states at the March 9, 2019 governorship elections held in their various states.
A seven-man panel of the apex court led by Justice Mary Peter-Odili, in separate judgments, affirmed the elections of Governors Babajide Sanwo-Olu of Lagos State, Nasir El-Rufai of Kaduna State, Udom Emmanuel of Akwa Ibom State, David Umahi of Ebonyi State, Aminu Masari of Katsina State, Dapo Abiodun of Ogun State and Abdullahi Sule of Nasarawa State.
While Makinde, Emmanuel and Umahi were of the Peoples Democratic Party, Sanwo-Olu, El-Rufai, Masari, Abiodun and Sule contested on the platform of the All Progressives Congress.
The panel heard the appeals on the governorship tussles from the eight states in two batches on Wednesday.
After each lap of hearing, the members of the panel retired to their chambers to prepare their judgment and returned about an hour after to give the summary of their verdicts on the appeals.
The Oyo State governorship dispute turned out to be the most contentious among the appeals decided by the apex court on Wednesday, as all the parties to the case filed separate appeals against the November 11, 2019 judgment of the Ibadan Division of the Court of Appeal.
Although, the Court of Appeal, had in its split judgment of four-to-one substantially upheld the case of the APC and its candidate in the governorship poll, Adebayo Adelabu, it refused to make any order nullifying Makinde’s election.
Therefore, the APC and Adelabu, through their lawyer, Aliyu Umar (SAN), had filed an appeal against the Court of Appeal’s judgment, urging the apex court to make a specific order nullifying Makinde’s victory at the poll.
Makinde, had also through his lawyer, Chief Wole Olanipekun (SAN), filed an appeal praying the apex court to set aside the majority judgment of the Court of Appeal and affirm the judgment of the election petition tribunal, which affirmed him as the duly elected governor of the state.
The PDP, through its lawyer, Nathaniel Oke (SAN), and the Independent National Electoral Commission, through its counsel, Akinlolu Kehinde (SAN), had also filed separate appeals against the majority judgment of the Court of Appeal.
At the hearing earlier on Wednesday, the apex court decided that its decision on the appeal filed by Makinde would be binding on the rest of the appeals on the governorship election in the state.
Justice Ejembi Eko, who delivered the lead judgment, overturned the November 11, 2019 judgment of the Ibadan Division of the Court of Appeal and restored the judgment of the Oyo State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal, which had declared Makinde and his party, the winner of the election.
Justice Eko said, “After going through the briefs of arguments, I find merit in this appeal.
“The judgment of the lower court is mainly based on perversity.
“The majority judgment is hereby set aside.
“The minority judgment/decision of the lower court represents a more sober reflection on the issues.”
In upholding El-Rufai’s election as Kaduna State governor, Justice Centus Nweze, who delivered the lead judgment, dismissed the appeal by Isah Ashiru of the PDP.
Justice Nweze noted that the concurrent judgments of both the tribunal and the Court of Appeal dismissing Ashiru’s appeal could only be set aside if found to be perverse and consistent in error.
But he noted that the appellants (Ashiru and the PDP) “failed to show the perversity in the concurrent judgments.”
“The issue in this appeal having been resolved against the appellant, I find no merit in the appeal and I hereby enter judgment dismissing the appeal,” he ruled.
Upholding the election of the APC’s Abdullahi Sule as the governor of Nasarawa State, Justice Mary Peter-Odili, who read the lead judgment, dismissed the appeal filed by the PDP and its candidate, David Ombugadu.
Justice Peter-Odili noted that the APC won in 13 local government areas, while the PDP won in only one.
She ruled that the appellants failed to prove their alleged case of “non-compliance affected the election.”
“This appeal fails, and it is hereby dismissed,” she added.
Concerning the Lagos State governorship dispute, Justice Paul Galinje delivered the lead judgments in two appeals challenging Sanwo-Olu’s election.
In the two judgments, Justice Galinje held that the appeal by the Labour Party and its candidate, Prof Ifagbemi Awamaridi, and the other by the Alliance for Democracy and its candidate, Chief Owolabi Salis, lacked merit.
He noted that he had no reason to interfere with the concurrent judgments of the tribunal and the Court of Appeal, which had both dismissed the appellants’ cases.
He added that their petitions instituted at the tribunal were not based on the grounds recognised by either the Constitution or the Electoral Act.
Justice Peter-Odili similarly dismissed the appeal by Adekunle Akinlade and his Allied Peoples Movement challenging the victory of Governor Dapo Abiodun of Ogun State.
She held that the appellants failed to prove the alleged non-compliance of the conduct of the March 9, 2011 poll in the state.
In respect of the Akwa Ibom State governorship tussle, Justice Dattijo Muhammad, who read the lead judgment, upheld Emmanuel’s election after dismissing the appeal by Nsima Ekere and his party, the APC, for lacking in merit.
Justice Amina Augie, who delivered the lead judgments in respect of the Ebonyi and Katsina governorship tussles, upheld the elections of the governors of the two states.
She dismissed the petition filed by the People’s Democratic Movement and his candidate, Chief Ajah Arua, as he held that they failed to prove that they were validly nominated to participate in the election, not to talk of proving that they were unlawfully excluded from the poll.
Upholding Masari’s election as Katsina State governor, Justice Augie dismissed the petition filed by the PDP and its candidate, Garba Lado.
The Punch
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has expelled Minister of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Nyesom Wike, its suspended National Secretary, Samuel Anyanwu, and former Governor of Ekiti State, Ayo Fayose.
Their expulsion was announced on Saturday at the party’s National Convention in Ibadan, Oyo State.
The Pentecostal Fellowship of Nigeria (PFN) has insisted that there is Christian genocide ongoing in Nigeria, hence demanding end to the alleged Christian killings.
Speaking on Thursday after an emergency executive meeting of the Fellowship held at its national headquarters in Lagos, PFN President, Bishop Francis Wale Oke, said the body would no longer remain silent while Christians are “targeted, killed, raped, and displaced” across the country.
He said: “There is Christian genocide going on in Nigeria. If we call it by any other name, it will bring Nigeria down. We are crying out to our international friends, beginning with America and Donald Trump. Whatever you can do to help our government put an end to it, come quickly and get it done. When on Christmas Day, Christmas Day was turned a bloody day in Benue State, and hundreds were massacred. And we are to be conducting mass funerals when we are not in open conflict. What do you call that? And this is different from individual cases.
“Let us call a spade a spade. There is Christian genocide ongoing in Nigeria,”Bishop Oke declared.
“Even while we speak, killings are still taking place in Borno, Plateau, and Benue states. When 501 Christians were massacred in Dogon Noma in Plateau, what do we call that? When Christmas Day turned into a bloody day in Benue, with hundreds massacred, what name should we give it?
While noting that the United States President Donald Trump spoke the truth, the PRN President cited the case of Leah Sharibu who was abducted alongside other Chibok girls and has since remained in captivity.
“Like the case of Leah Sharibu. Where is Leah Sharibu? Like the case of Deborah that was lynched and burned alive in Sokoto? What about that? And several of our girls were kidnapped and forced, given out as wives by force without the consent of their parents and their Christian parents. And the Christian parents would not see them for years.And this has been going on. We have been talking and we are not taking it seriously. And it has been going on again and again, until Donald Trump now spoke. And Donald Trump spoke the truth. There is Christian genocide going on in Nigeria.
“Like you will have picked in the news, even since this narrative began, killing was still going on in Borno, in Plateau, in Benue, up until yesterday. What are we saying? When 501 Christians were massacred in Dogonaya in Plateau State, what do we call that? And for no offense other than they are Christians.”
Oke recalled that the Christian community had repeatedly called the attention of the government to the alleged genocide with no decisive action from the authority.
The cleric expressed his backing for President Trump’s intervention, adding that Trump only echoed what Nigerian Christians had been saying for year
“I was part of the team that went to see the immediate past President, Muhammadu Buhari. We spoke very strongly about this and the President listened to us, but he completely ignored the main issue we came for, If we came and spoke with such vehemence, with such passion, and then you pick the peripheral matter and left this matter alone, I knew that day that his government was complicit in what was going on,” he added.
Oke alleged that the killings across parts of Nigeria were systematic and targeted on Christians, lamenting that the killings had continued unchecked despite repeated appeals from the Church.
“The evidence is all over the place. There is nothing anybody can say that can whitewash it. It is evil, it is blood shedding, it is mass murder and it is genocide. The time to stop it is now. That is what the church in Nigeria is saying with one voice.
“Christians in this nation must be free to practice their faith in any part of Nigeria as bona fide citizens of Nigeria.
“These armed bandits, Fulani herdsmen, Boko Haram, ISWAP, all of them using Islam as a cover. We have been living in peace with our Muslim brothers for a long, until this violent Islamic sect came up with an intent to make sure they impose Sharia on all Nigerians,” Oke said.
Bishop Oke called on President Bola Tinubu to decisively overhaul the nation’s security architecture, and ensure justice for victims of religious violence. He questioned why those responsible for notorious attacks—such as the killing of Deborah Samuel in Sokoto and the abduction of Leah Sharibu and the Chibok schoolgirls—remain unpunished.
“The government should prove by action, not words, that it is not complicit,” he said. “When hundreds are buried in mass graves and the whole world sees it, who can deny it? Why should we play politics with the blood of Nigerians?”
The PFN urged President Tinubu’s administration to rebuild trust by ensuring that the security architecture of the country is not infiltrated by those sympathetic to extremist ideologies.
Oke further condemned the government’s rehabilitation of so-called “repentant terrorists,” describing the move as a grave security.
He assured Christians that the PFN would continue to speak out until the killings stop. “We are not going to keep quiet. We will keep raising our voices until justice is done and every Nigerian, regardless of faith, can live in peace. The truth may be suppressed for a time, but it cannot be buried forever,” he said.
The meeting, which drew PFN leaders from across the country, reaffirmed the body’s commitment to national unity, peace, and the protection of fundamental human rights, while urging the media to “side with the oppressed” and report the truth without fear or bias.
US President Donald Trump has signed a federal spending bill, officially ending the longest government shutdown in American history.
The legislation, passed by the House of Representatives in a 222–209 vote, followed narrow approval in the Senate just two days earlier. The bill restores funding to federal agencies after 43 days of closure, bringing relief to millions of government employees and citizens affected by halted services.
Speaking after signing the measure on Wednesday night, Trump described the deal as a political victory, asserting that Democrats unnecessarily prolonged the shutdown.
“They didn’t want to do it the easy way. They had to do it the hard way, and they look very bad,” he said.
The temporary funding bill maintains government operations only through 30 January, creating a new deadline for lawmakers to negotiate a long-term budget solution.
As part of the agreement, Senate leaders committed to an early December vote on Obamacare subsidies, a key priority for Democrats during the shutdown standoff.
In addition to reopening federal offices, the bill provides full-year funding for the Department of Agriculture, military construction projects, and several legislative branch offices.
It also ensures retroactive pay for federal workers affected by the shutdown and allocates funding to the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, SNAP, which helps about one in eight Americans access food.
The shutdown, which began in October, forced the suspension of many government services, leaving an estimated 1.4 million federal employees either furloughed or working without pay. It also disrupted food assistance programmes and caused widespread delays in domestic air travel.
With federal operations now resumed, attention in Washington has turned to whether Congress and the White House can reach a longer-term funding agreement before the new deadline at the end of January.
