RIVERS ELECTION NULLIFICATION, BEFORE AND AFTER

RIVERS ELECTION NULLIFICATION: BEFORE AND AFTER
1) The Rivers Election Tribunal was unnecessarily relocated to Abuja even when all other Judicial Institutions of the State are still sitting and functioning in Rivers State. For example, The Court of Appeal, which is a higher judicial body to the Tribunal, is still sitting. The Federal High Court is a higher Federal Institution and still sitting. There was no reported case of breakdown of Law in Rivers State, as is the case in the North East, to justify the purported movement of the Tribunal to Abuja. So, the only logical explanation is that the movement of the Tribunal had pre-determined objectives of manipulating the tribunal and its members.

2) The Chairman of the Tribunal, the Hon Justice Pindiga, was curiously removed mid-way, contrary to all extant procedures for no clearly stated reason. None of the parties applied for an injunction against him as would be the norm. This is evidently to achieve the already determined objective of the powers that be.

3) In the cause of the Petition hearing, there was an open and deliberate attempt to arrest the witnesses of Governor Wike who came to testify on his behalf. This is intended to intimidate and harass witnesses away from coming to give vital evidence at the Tribunal. This happened twice.

4) The Tribunal did not evaluate the evidence of over a hundred witnesses that testified; neither did it scrutinise tons of exhibit and documents that were tendered before it, because it had planned to give judgement barely 24hours after adoption of the final addresses by the council. This is utterly strange and indeed leads to the obvious miscarriage of justice by annulling the election.

It is not in doubt in all the given precedence and issues raised above that the decision of annulling the Rivers State elections was predetermined, politically motivated, and influenced by extrajudicial forces. But this is only a Physical victory which will certainly turn on Appeal.

We invite all men of good will and conscience to speak against this brazen act of thuggery, brigadage and judicial recklessness before the society is plunged into a clearly avoidable catastrophie.