Court will decide winner of Imo North bye-election - INEC

The Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) said on Friday that only the court could determine the real candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) as well as the winner of last weekend’s Imo North Senatorial Bye-Election.

Controversy over the matter erupted after the Court of Appeal nullified the candidature of Chief Ifeanyi Araraume and pronounced Mr Frank Ibezim as the rightful candidate.

Simultaneously, a Federal High Court in Abuja disqualified Ibezim from contesting the election for what it said were discrepancies in the documents he submitted to INEC for the election.

Regardless, the election went on with INEC declaring the APC as the winner.

INEC National Commissioner and Chairman of its Information and Voter Education Committee, Festus Okoye, said yesterday that the Commission declared APC winner of the election without a candidate because of the conflicting court judgments.

His words: “Three things may likely happen in the Imo North Senatorial Bye-election. One of the candidates is already in the Supreme Court and the issue in the Supreme Court is whether the Federal High Court has jurisdiction to entertain the matter in the first place and whether the matter was decided first within the domestic realm of the party.

“If the Supreme Court determines that the court of the first instance has jurisdiction over the matter, the implication is that Senator Ifeanyi Araraume becomes the candidate of the party and will now be returned as duly elected.

“If on the other hand, the Supreme Court determines that the Court of Appeal was right in striking out the matter and that the court of the first instance does not have jurisdiction over the matter, that means that Senator Ifeanyi Araraume is out of the contest.”

Okoye spoke on a television programme.