The Supreme Court has affirmed the nomination of Mohamed Omar Bio as the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) for the House of Representatives election in Baruten /Kaiama Federal constituency of Kwara state.

Five Justices of the apex court, in a unanimous decision, upheld the earlier decisions of Kwara state High court and the Court of Appeal that Omar was duly nominated for the election having won the APC primary election in the federal constituency.

The Justices include Amina Auchi, Sanusi A, Okoro JSC, Nwese JSC and Ekpu JSC.
House of Representatives aspirant on the platform of APC Abubakar Othman had November 15, 2018 in suit KWS/404/2018 approached Kwara state High court to challenge the nomination of Bio by APC.

Othman also asked the court to declare him as the candidate of APC in Baruten/ Kaiama Federal constituency in the February 23,2019 National Assembly elections.
In the suit, he joined the APC and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) as codefendants.

Barrister Razak Alabi represented Bio while Chief Sunday Ashaolu represented APC in the suit.

He also appealed the judgment of the court at Court of Appeal in appeal no CA/IL/57/2019 and Supreme Court in appeal no SC/724/2019 filed on June 6 this year.

While ruling on the suit, the Supreme Court dismissed it and held that it was not filed within the statute time stipulated by the law.

The court declared the case as staled and unenforceable having failed to satisfy section 289(9) of the 1999 Constitution fourth alteration which required that the suit to be filed within 14 days of the acquiral cause of action which is the day of placement of names by the third defendant which is INEC.

The Court held that the primary election was conducted by the APC on October 5,2018 but the suit was not filed until November 15, 2018 which was outside the statutory period prescribed by law.

Reacting to the ruling of the apex court, Chief Sunday Ashaolu, who represented APC in the suit, said that the judgement has put an end to who is the winner of the APC primary election and the candidate of the party in the just concluded National Assembly election in Kaiama/Baruten federal constituency of Kwara state.

INEC had on February 24, declared Omar Bio as the winner of the House of Representatives election on the platform of APC in the constituency having polled the highest number of votes.

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