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The National Assembly Elections Petition Tribunal sitting in Lagos has nullified the election of the Labour Party candidate, Seyi Sowunmi, as the House of Representatives member for Ojo Federal Constituency in Lagos State.
The Justice Abdullahi Ozegya-led three-man panel instead declared Lanre Ogunyemi of the All Progressives Congress (APC) as the duly elected candidate of the February 25, 2023 election.
The other members of the panel are Justice Ashu Ewah and Justice Muhammad Sambo.
Ogunyemi is a two-term member of the Lagos State House of Assembly and erstwhile secretary of the APC in Lagos.
He had challenged the declaration of Sowunmi by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) as the winner of the election on the grounds that the respondent was not duly sponsored and qualified to contest the election under the candidacy of the Labour Party for Ojo Federal Constituency.
Ruling on the petition, the tribunal agreed with Ogunyemi that the Labour Party candidate failed to meet the requisite conditions to contest the elections.
It, therefore, declared the votes recorded for the respondent wasted and held that the second runner-up, APC’s Ogunyemi should have been declared winner of Ojo Federal Constituency.
This comes on the same day a Court of Appeal sitting in Owerri, Imo State, sacked Julius Abure and affirmed Lamidi Apapa as the National Chairman of the Labour Party.
The court also ordered the INEC to immediately recognise and publish the names of all the governorship candidates produced by the Apapa-led National Working Committee in Imo, Bayelsa, and Kogi states ahead of the November 11 governorship elections in the three states.