PDP, Labour Par­ty, Two Others Ask Lagos Election Tribunal To Sack Sanwo-Olu

The Lagos State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal has been asked to nullify the victory of Gover­nor Babajide Sanwo-Olu of the All Progressive Congress (APC) in the March 18 Lagos gubernatorial election.

OsunDaily News recalls that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) had stated that Sanwo-olu won the election by polling 762,134 votes.

The commission said Gbadebo Rhodes-Vivour of the Labour Party (LP), who scored 312,329 votes, came second, while Abdul-Azeez Adediran, aka Jandor of the Peoples Democratic Party, came a distant third with 62,449 votes.

However, PDP, Labour Par­ty, Allied People’s Movement (APM), and the Action People’s Party (APP) have now separate­ly asked to nullify San­wo-Olu’s victory in their petitions filed before the tribunal.

LP Petition

Rhodes-Vivour, who filed as sole petitioner, listed three grounds on which his petition was based.

He alleged that Sanwo-Olu was not qualified to contest elec­tion when the election took place, adding that the elec­tion of Sanwo-Olu was invalid because of corrupt practices or non-compliance with the pro­visions of the Electoral Act 2022 and the constitution.

He added that the gover­nor-elect was not duly elected by the majority of the lawful votes cast at the election.

PDP Petition

In the petition filed by Adediran and his party, PDP, the petitioners listed two grounds of appeal to the effect that Sanwo-Olu and his deputy, Obafemi Hamzat, were at the time of the election not qualified to contest.

Adediran also stated that Rhodes-Vivour, who was declared by the first respon­dent, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) haven scored the second high­est number of votes, was, at the time of the election, not quali­fied to contest.

INEC was the first respon­dent in the petition filed by Adediran, while Sanwo-Olu; Hamzat, APC; Rhodes-Vivour, and LP were listed as the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 5th, and 6th respon­dents, respectively.

The PDP governorship candidate called for the dis­qualification of APC and the LP candidates in the election for non-compliance with the Electoral Act 2022 and the guidelines of INEC.

Adediran also asked that all votes cast for them in the elec­tion be declared wasted.