Three political parties out of the 14 that contested the 2023 gubernatorial election in Bauchi State have filed a case before the election petition tribunal sitting in Bauchi.
They are challenging the declaration of Governor of Bauchi State Senator Bala Abdulkadir Muhammad as winner of the recently held election in the state.
The petitioners include Governorship candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC),Air Marshal Sadique Baba Abubakar, Allied Peoples Movement (APM), and Peoples Redemption Party (PRP) .
They separately took Governor Bala Abdulkadir Muhammad to the election tribunal.
The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had declared Bala Mohammed of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as the winner of the March 18 governorship election in Bauchi.
Bala scored 525,280 votes to clinch the seat and defeated his closest contender, APC’s Sadique Abubakar, who came second with 432,272 votes. Senator Halliru Jika of the New Nigeria People’s Party (NNPP) came third with 60,496 votes.
The respondents include INEC, Bala Mohammed, and his party, the PDP.
The petitioners alleged that elections were not conducted in substantial compliance with a mandatory requirement of the Electoral Act, 2022 and guidelines. They said the election was marred by irregularities, unauthenticated alterations of results, among others.
It wasn’t clear if the candidate of New Nigeria Peoples Party NNPP Halliru Dauda Jika challenged the elections of Governor Bala Mohammed, but officials of the NNPP confirmed that initially he had intention to challenge the election. “We have signed all the papers but we traveled to lesser Hajj. I don’t know if it was filed or not.”
Media aide to Senator Jika, Haruna Mohammed said “I can’t comment on that until I receive a clearance from the Senator I will get back to you”
The tribunal had pasted the petitions filed by the candidates and the Tribunal Chairman Justice Flora Ngozie Azinge ordered the petitioners to serve the respondents through substituted means.
