The impeached Deputy Governor of Edo State, Phillip Shaibu, says he has been vindicated by Thursday’s Federal High Court, Abuja, judgment invalidating the People’s Democratic Party, PDP, governorship primary election of Edo State.
Shuaibu, who reacted on to the judgment delivered by Justice Inyang Edem Ekwo, dismissed what PDP tagged as a primary election on February 22, 2024, as nothing but a tea party with no force of law.
He said he had made it clear that the PDP killed internal democracy with the fraudulent ways it organised its purported primary election at the Samuel Ogbemudia Stadium in Benin.
The former Deputy Governor said those who voted for him at his parallel primary election were the authentic delegates lawfully chosen by the people to nominate the governorship candidate for PDP.
Shuaibu said there was nothing wrong for him to join the All Progressives Congress, APC, as long as democracy remains a game for the vast majority of people.
According to him, “When you see a political party wooing people to its group, that party wants to win but when you see a party chasing people away as in the case of the PDP, that party is planning nothing but rigging of election.:
Indeed, Justice Inyang Edem Ekwo had in his judgment invalidated the February 22 PDP primary election on the ground that 378 delegates who were supposed to vote in the election were unlawfully excluded.
In the ruling delivered on Thursday, the presiding judge, Ekwo held that the PDP primary held on February 22 failed to comply with the provisions of the Electoral Act 2022 and the party’s constitution.
Ekwo held that from the exhibit tendered in court, the returning officers who prepared the result sheets only sat in one place to falsify the outcome of the poll.
He said the exclusion of the 381 delegates, including the plaintiffs, was against the provisions of the law.
The judge further held that even though the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) filed a memorandum of appearance in the suit, it was unfortunate that the commission did not file any process in the case
