Adamawa Election: Supreme Court Dismisses Suit Against Senator Abbo

A suit brought against Senator Elisha Abbo challenging his candidacy as the All Progressives Congress (APC) representative for Adamawa North Senatorial District in the last National Assembly election has been dismissed by the Supreme Court on Wednesday.

Justice Inyang Okoro, in a unanimous judgment of a five-member panel of Justices, dismissed the suit for lacking in merit.

One Abdullahi Suleiman had dragged the senator to court challenging his emergence at the primary election conducted by the APC for Adamawa North Senatorial District.

However, the apex court held that Suleiman was not competent to challenge the outcome of the election, having not participated in the said election.

The appellant, therefore, through his Counsel, withdrew the appeal, and the apex court subsequently dismissed it.

Abbo of the APC won the March 25 senatorial election after scoring 71,927 votes while the PDP candidate, Rev. Yohanna Amos, scored 61,895 votes to come second, thus returning to the Red Chamber.

Abbo had travelled a rough path to his victory; he was in court before the election fighting to lift an expulsion from the APC slammed on him by his Mubi North party executives after he fought a verbal war against APC’s Muslim-Muslim ticket.

A Yola High Court presided by Justice Mohammed Danladi had sacked Abbo as the APC Senatorial candidate for Adamawa North senatorial zone for the March 25 election.

The court sacked him on the grounds that he was expelled from the party by his ward in Mubi.

However, the appellate court nullified the judgment of the State High Court, which upheld his expulsion from the ruling party, as earlier announced by the party’s leadership.

The court said the trial court had no jurisdiction to entertain the matter, affirming that Abbo is a card-carrying member of the APC and is entitled to seek re-election into the Senate through his party’s ticket.