Justice Inyang Ekwo in his judgments in 24 different suits brought before him by the Labour Party, held that INEC violated sections 31, 33 and 36 of the Electoral Act 2022 in rejecting Labour Party candidates in the affected states on the ground of non-functionality of its nomination portal.
The Labour Party had last November conducted substitution nominations for its candidates who withdrew from the 2023 general elections in the affected states.
However, at the point of uploading the fresh candidate’s names, INEC claimed that its nomination portal was faulty and declined to accept the candidates list manually promoting the 24 legal actions.
Justice Ekwo in the judgment said that the evidence of the Labour Party through exchanged letters with INEC in the nomination issue was credible and proceeded to attach probative value to it.
The judge held that the consequences of non-functional electronic nomination portal cannot be visited on the Labour Party.
