The April 11, 2008, Appeal Court’s ruling in Kaduna on the Sokoto State gubernatorial election of April 14, 2007, in which the court set aside the Sokoto State Governorship and Legislative Houses Election Tribunal’s earlier ruling on the matter is very clear on the parties and candidates that are qualified for the ordered re-run election.

Ordinarily, such a ruling should not have generated multiple interpretations as has presently become the case were it not for the insistence of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP’s) governorship candidate for the nullified election, Alhaji Aliyu Magatakarda Wamakko, that he is still qualified for the re-run despite the very fact that his election was set aside based on non-qualification, among other reasons.

Wamakko’s election was nullified by the appeal court for monumental irregularities that include double nomination, electoral fraud and other sharp practices that were inconsistent with the provisions of the Electoral Act 2006 and relevant sections of the Nigerian constitution as they concern the gubernatorial elections.

With the appeal court’s ruling on the matter, it stands to reason that the PDP and Wamakko cannot present themselves for the Sokoto re-run. There are many reasons for this line of thinking. But the most primary is the fact that Wamakko’s nomination ab initio was faulty, as he was not properly nominated before he ran for the highly flawed election. Under the re-run election, there is no room again for re-nomination because nomination of candidates ended 60 days before the April 14, 2007 polls. Therefore, if Wamakko did not qualify on April 14, 2007, what then qualified him now? Was there a fresh nomination execise arranged strictly for Wamakko? The answer is No.

Consequently, it would have been better for Wamakko and his supporters to grasp this very fact before deluding themselves with the drunken hope that they are qualified for the Sokoto re-run. In their wildest imagination and day-dreaming, they have ignorantly anchored their reason for nursing such false hope on page 16 of the court of appeal judgement simply identified as Exhibit R8 which is a form used by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) for the declaration of the gubernatorial election result in respect of Sokoto State in which Wamakko’s name and that of his party, the PDP, must of necessity appear. It is this list that Wamakko and his party are capitalizing upon to insist that they are qualified for the re-run race whereas the reverse is the case.

The PDP, in making this myopic reading into the judgement, has lost sight of the fact that once a candidate stands disqualified for an election, there is no way he can still be qualified for the same election without going through another round of qualification or nomination process, which in this peculiar case has been closed. The PDP is just trying to cause mischief in a matter that is very clear. Why can’t the party respect simple electoral rules? Why must it subvert laid down rules because it wants to rule a state by all means?

The fact that the PDP is enlisting the support of Human Rights Monitor, a shadowy non-governmental organization, shows how bad its case is. The recourse to extraneous arguments in interpreting the appeal court’s ruling in the said matter really shows how desperate the PDP and Wamakko are in getting power at all cost in Sokoto State. This desperation, if allowed, is capable of eroding the very tenets of our nascent democratic dispensation.

There is no confusion or ambiguity on who should run for the fresh polls as ordered by the appeal court. The only confusion on the issue is in the minds of Wamakko and his diminishing supporters who are intent on fomenting trouble in Sokoto State because everything now is heavily against them in their bid to remain in power in the state. But in spite of that self-serving confusion, we still believe that the courts rather than these pressure groups are eminently qualified to interpret what the appeal court meant by the contents of the contentious Exhibit R8 vis-à-vis its ruling that Wamakko ab initio was not qualified for the Sokoto State gubernatorial election.

For the avoidance of doubt and to reinforce the fact that Wamakko cannot stand for the Sokoto State re-run polls, it is pertinent to refresh the minds of the public on some of the contentious issues concerning the Sokoto State governorship election of April 14, 2007.

Following the charade called an election in Sokoto State which purportedly returned Wamakko as governor, the Democratic Peoples Party (DPP’s) candidate for the election, Alhaji Muhammadu Maigari Dingyadi, went to the tribunal to seek for justice instead of resorting to self-help. The DPP and its candidate challenged Wamakko’s election on faulty nomination, monumental electoral irregularities and fraud that contravened the provisions of the Electoral Act 2006 and relevant sections of the Nigerian constitution.

However, the hope of DPP to get justice at the tribunal failed because the Justices of the Tribunal were either biased or outrightly mischievous or both. The tribunal’s ruling, which has now been confrrmed to be a travesty of justice, was appealed against by the DPP.

In its ruling, the court of appeal rightly found out and stated that there were multiple nominations in respect of Aliyu Magatakarda Wamakko in breach of the provisions of Section 187(1) of the constitution. It noted that Aliyu Wamakko had nominated one Senator Bello J. Gada as his running mate to occupy the office of Deputy Governor, but Alhaji Mukhtari Shehu Shagari was returned as Deputy Governor.

The court however berated the electoral umpire as it ruled that the officers of INEC have in this case portrayed the commission as an irresponsible organization, which is ready to perpetrate illegality and scuttle the nascent democracy for whatever reason best known to them. According to the appeal court, “It was very clear from the circumstances of this case that INEC was working with gloves in hand along with some political parties in Sokoto to pervert the cause of justice.”

Based on these and other facts, the Court of Appeal set aside the judgement of the Sokoto Election Tribunal delivered on the 29th of October 2007. It subsequently annulled the Sokoto State governorship election held on April 14, 2007 due to substantial irregularities in the conduct of the election and on the ground that the 1st Respondent (Wamakko) was not qualified to contest the election as at the 14th day of April 2007. It therefore ordered for a fresh election within 90 days from the date of the ruling.

It provides that the election will be between the same parties and candidates as appear on Exhibit R8. Though the name of Wamakko and PDP appeared on the Exhibit R8, by the reason of his non-qualification for the April 14, 2007 election, he still stands not qualified for the re-run. Allowing them to run is another way of overlooking the inadequacies of their non-qualification in the April 14, 2007 polls, the major reason for which the election was set aside.

But the obvious implication of the appeal court’s judgement orders numbers 2, 4, and the authority of the yet unreported referral judgement in CA/K/69/2008 Labour Party V Independent National Electoral Commission delivered on April 10, 2008 by the Court of Appeal Kaduna is that neither the 1st nor the 2nd Respondent is qualified to contest in the fresh elections.

In the case of the 1st Respondent, he was not qualified to contest in the April 14, 2007 election and in the case of the 2nd Respondent; it cannot nominate anyone else to contest as its candidate by virtue of order No. 4.

Also the Exhibit R8 mentioned in order 4 of the judgement order forming part of the judgement is the Declaration of Result of Election to the Office of Governor Form dated 15th April, 2007 and it only stands to reason that order 2 having stated that the 1st Respondent was not qualified to contest as at April 14, 2007 and no fresh nomination being possible now, the 1st Respondent cannot stand as a candidate for the fresh elections in view of his non-qualification ab initio. That is the hard fact that Wamakko and the PDP must face.

Sirajo writes from Sokoto.