Court of Appeal orders rerun of Zamfara gov poll in three LGAs, says election inconclusive

The Court of Appeal in Abuja has ordered a rerun of the governorship election Zamfara State governorship election, after declaring the exercise held on March 18, 2023 inconclusive.

The three-member panel of justices led by Justice Oyebisi Folayemi, on Thursday nullified the return of Governor Dauda Lawal of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) as the winner of the governorship poll.

In the lead judgement read by Justice Sybil Nwaka, the court ordered the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to conduct a fresh election in three Local Government Areas of the state, where elections had not been held previously or where results from various polling units were not counted.

The affected LGAs are Maradun, Birnin-Magaji and Bukkuyum.

The court held that it was wrong for INEC to rely on information it obtained from its INEC Result Viewing (IReV) portal, to collate the final result of the governorship election.

The judgement was delivered in an appeal brought before the court by the immediate past governor of the state, Bello Matawalle, who was the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) in the election.

Matawalle was later appointed by President Bola Tinubu as the Minister of State for Defence.
Details later ….