Tobias Sylvester
The Supreme Court has dismissed an appeal filed by a governorship aspirant on the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in Bayelsa State, Timi Alaibe, challenging the emergence of Governor Douye Diri as the party’s candidate in 2019 election.
A five-man panel of the apex court led by Justice Olabode Rhodes-Vivour dismissed the appeal on Tuesday, July 14, 2020.
Alaibe was challenging the emergence of Diri as the lawful candidate of the PDP for the November 16, 2019 governorship election in Bayelsa State.
Alaibe, who had lost the suit at both the Federal High Court in Owerri and the Port Harcourt Division of the Court of Appeal, had in the suit challenged the participation of two delegates who voted in the primary that produced Diri as the party’s candidate.
During the preliminary hearing on Tuesday, the Justice Rhodes-Vivour panel informed Adedipe that his case could not be categorised as a pre-election case that a court could entertain but about an internal affair of the party which the court lacked jurisdiction to hear.
Adedipe and his lawyer, Chief Ifedayo Adedipe, the withdrew the suit after the panel members pointed his attention to the fact that the issues raised in the appeal were not about the primary election, but about an internal affair of the party.
KanyiDailu recalls that Governor Duoye Diri was sworn in on February 14, 2020, a day after the Supreme Court sacked the former governor-elect of Bayelsa State, David Lyon, and his Deputy, Biobarakuma Degi-Eremieoyo.
