The Speaker of the Delta State House of Assembly, Sherrif Oborevwori, on Friday, filed a notice of appeal to challenge the judgment of the Federal High Court in Abuja which sacked him from contesting as the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party for the March 11, 2023 governorship election in the state.
Justice Taiwo Taiwo had on Thursday, July 7, 2022, ordered the PDP and Independent National Electoral Commission to replace Oborevwori with David Edevbie as the lawful candidate of the PDP for the election.
He held that Oborevwori was not eligible to contest the election because he supplied false information to INEC to back his nomination as his party’s candidate.
The judgment was sequel to a suit filed by Edevbie, a former Commissioner of Finance during the administration of former Governor James Ibori.
Edevbie came second behind Oborevwori, a loyalist of Governor Ifeanyi Okowa, in the May 25, 2022 primary election of the PDP.
Edevbi filed his originating summons in the suit on June 3, 2022, through his counsel, Habeeb Oredola.
In his originating summons, he alleged, among others, the inconsistencies in the names on the academic certificates submitted by Oborevwori to INEC.
He sued Oborevwori, the PDP and INEC as first to the third respondents respectively.
The first defendant, as alleged by the plaintiff, falsified the information on his age and name.
It was further alleged that the first defendant forged/presented a fake WAEC result bearing the name of someone else entirely and a date.
Oborevwori, in his defence, filed a counter-affidavit and written address on June 17, asking the court to hold that the complaint against his qualification to contest the primaries was not justifiable.
He also contended that the plaintiff could not initiate the suit according to Section 29 of the Electoral Act, 2022.
On its part, the second defendant argued that the plaintiff’s suit was premature, academic and of no utilitarian value.
While delivering judgment, the judge held that the plaintiff’s suit was meritorious as Oborevwori failed to provide contrary evidence to contradict the claims in the suit.
Justice Taiwo also held that several weighty allegations of fraud were raised in the affidavit in support of the originating summons as well as the Further and Better Affidavit filed by the plaintiff, adding that the allegations were not addressed by the first and second defendants.