Edo State Governor, Godwin Obaseki, has defeated the All Progressives Congress, APC, at the Court of Appeal in Abuja.
The court, on Thursday, dismissed the alleged University of Ibadan degree certificate forgery filed against the Governor by the APC.
According to the court, the suit by the governor’s former party lacked merit as it awarded N250,000 cost in favour of Obaseki
The presiding judge, Justice Ahmed Ramat Mohammed of the Federal High Court in Abuja had on January 9, 2021, threw aside the case of university certificate forgery against the governor.
The FHC judge, in his ruling, had said that the APC’s allegation was strange and like a story of an outsider telling a man in his house that he is not the father of a child.
However, the party, not satisfied with the ruling, headed to the higher court, challenging the judgment of the lower court.
Delivering his ruling, Justice Stephen Adah held that the FHC Abuja was right in its findings and conclusion in the APC suit.
Justice Adah upheld the testimony of the Deputy Registrar, Mr Abayomi Ajayi, who confirmed that the governor was a student of the University of Ibadan in 1976 and fulfilled the requirement for admission to study Classical .
He held that the evidence of the Deputy Registrar was direct in showing that Obaseki did not forge any certificate he submitted to the Independent National Electoral Commission INEC to secure his clearance for participation in the governorship election.
That based on that, Governor Obaseki fulfilled all requirements to contest for the governorship position of Edo state and that he did not violate section 182 99 Constitution
Justice Adah further said the APC failed to prove the certificate forgery allegation and that the appeal is quite unmeritorious and dismissed it with N250, 000 cost in favour of governor Obaseki and another N50 ,000 each in favour of the Peoples Democratic Party PDP and INEC
The APC had disqualified Governor Obaseki from participating in its primary election prior to the 2020 governorship election in Edo State.
This led the governor to dump the ruling party and joined the main Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, where he was given the ticket to run in the election which he contested and won.
Obaseki defeated the candidate of the APC, Pastor Osagie Ize-Iyamu with a wide margin of votes to retain his seat for a second term.
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