In a bid to curtail political interference in the dispensation of justice, the president of the Court of Appeal, Justice Monica Dongban-Mensem, has transferred all election petition cases pending before the court in the 36 states to Abuja and Lagos divisions of the appellate court, Leadership reports.
All appellate cases arising from the judgement of the various election petition tribunals in the 36 states of the country would be heard and determined in Abuja and Lagos divisions of the Appeal Court.
By this action of Dongban-Mensem, only two of the 20 divisions of the court would determine all appellate cases arising from the judgements of the elections petition tribunals throughout the country.
The order affects gubernatorial, national and state assemblies’ elections, which have the court of appeal as the last court of adjudication.
An impeccable sources in the Court of Appeal headquarters in Abuja revealed that all appellate cases arising from the judgements of the election petitions tribunals on the 1,209 cases filed against the conduct of 2023 general elections had been assigned to Abuja and Lagos for hearing and determination.
Already, all political parties and their candidates, having pending appeal cases have been directed to comply with the order by moving to either Lagos or Abuja as the case may be to prosecute their cases.
Investigation revealed that Dongban-Mensem acted in response to an avalanche of petitions and protests by political parties and their candidates, who allege that the judges of the tribunals were heavily compromised by the governors during the trial stage in their respective states.
The governing party, All Progressives Congress (APC), and two opposition platforms, Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Labour Party (LP), and their aggrieved candidates in their various petitions and protests to the leadership of the court of appeal alleged that the judges of the tribunals became vulnerable as governors generously provided logistics and other support for them to ease the discharge of their assignments.
The aggrieved parties and the candidates protested that various judgements pronounced by some of the tribunal judges were not only fraudulent but were “outrightly purchased” by the governors in favour of their parties and candidates in the election.
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