The Bayelsa State governor, Duoye Diri has filed an appeal challenging the decision of the Governorship Election petition tribunal which sacked him from office as governor.
The tribunal had upheld the petition filed by Lucky King-George, candidate of the Advanced Nigeria Democratic Party (ANDP), on grounds that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) was wrong to have excluded the party from the November 16, 2019 governorship election.
It therefore ordered INEC to conduct a fresh poll in the state within 90 days.
In a split judgment, two out of three judges sacked the governor but Ibrahim Sirajo, chairman of the tribunal, in his dissenting judgment, dismissed ANDP’s petition.
Diri, through his counsel, Chris Uche, has filed a notice of appeal.
The appellant submitted that the tribunal erred in law when it held that ANDP’s petition was not statute-barred.
It said, the petitioners ought to have filed their petition within 21 days from when the cause of action arose on November 16, 2019, being the election day from which they claimed to have been excluded. Rather, the petition was filed more than five months after.
