The Commission is a law-abiding institution and will continue to obey and respect court orders.
By section 143(1) of the Electoral Act, if the Tribunal determines that a candidate returned as elected was not validly elected, then if notice of appeal is filed within 21 days from the date of the decision, the candidate returned as elected shall notwithstanding the contrary decision remain in office pending the determination of the appeal. The Commission is not obligated to give effect to the said judgement of the Tribunal till the parties exhaust their right of appeal as provided in the law.
Moreover, there are germane constitutional issues raised by the judgement and the Commission will take a position when it receives the certified true copy of the judgement. This is because the issues raised in the petition revolve around the invalidity of the nomination of the Deputy Governorship candidate.
Furthermore, the issue of nomination and substitution of candidates raised in the petition fall within the ambit of pre-election issues covered by the 4th alteration to the Constitution that must be filed within 14 days of the occurrence of the event. From the records in the Commission, the Advanced Nigeria Democratic Party (ANDP) was one of the Political Parties that signified its intention to contest the Bayelsa Governorship Election that took place on the 16th day of November 2019. From our records, the party conducted party primaries and at the end of the exercise it submitted the name of one Peter Esinkuma
David as its Deputy Governorship candidate.
From the affidavit evidencing age and the affidavit sworn to by the candidate, the age of the candidate at the time of the submission of their nomination was 34 years contrary to section 177(b) of the Constitution that makes it mandatory that only those who are 35 and above can contest the election. In the candidates’ statutory declaration of age and affidavit attached to his form, the Party stated that the candidate was born on the 10th day of February 1985. On the 13th day of September, 2019, the Commission wrote to the Party drawing their attention to the constitutional agerequirement of 35 years for Governorship/Deputy Governorship candidates as stipulated in section 177(b) of the Constitution.
The Commission also informed them of the invalidity of their nomination for the 16th November 2019 Governorship election in Bayelsa State.
On the 21st day of September 2019 and in response to the letter of the Commission dated the 13th September 2019, the Advanced Nigeria Democratic Party wrote to the Commission acknowledging the invalidity of their nomination and forwarding the name of one Miss INOWEI JANETH as their new Deputy Governorship candidate.
On the 27th of September 2019, the Commission informed the Party that the deadline for the submission of nominations as provided for in the Timetable and Schedule of Activities released by the Commission on 16th May 2019 was 9th September 2019. The Commission also informed the Party that since they did not submit valid nomination, they couldn’t validly substitute any candidate.
Consequently, the name and logo of the Party did not appear and was not reflected in the ballot paper.
