On Tuesday, the news of the sack of Chief Timipre Sylva, the governorship candidate of the All Progressive Congress, APC in the November poll by the Federal High Court trended on all the national dailies.
Justice Donatus Okorowo in a judgement delivered on Monday, October 9, 2023 ruled that Sylva was not qualified to be in the Bayelsa governorship race while dealing with a lawsuit filed by Chief Demesuoyefa Kolomo, a member of the APC, on June 13, 2023.
In the suit marked FHC/ABJ/CS/821/2023, Justice Okorowo averred that Sylva, having been sworn in twice and ruled for five years as governor of Bayelsa State, would breach the 1999 constitution (as amended) if allowed to contest again.
The judge also declared that Sylva was not qualified to run in the November 11 poll because if he wins and is sworn-in, he would spend more than eight years in office as governor of the state.
Though the party has said that they’re heading to the appeal court, here are reasons, I think the appeal will end in futility except the court as usual, dwell on technicalities and not merit of the case:
Should Sylva be allowed on the ballot and he wins, he would have spent 9 years as a governor by the time he will be leaving in 2028. This clearly contravenes the 1999 Constitution, as amended, which stipulates a maximum of two terms or eight years for a governor.
the amendment of section 180(2) (a) of the 1999 constitution further compounds Sylva’s dilemma.
The amended section reads:
“In the determination of the four year term, where a re-run election has taken place and the person earlier sworn in wins the re-run election, the time spent in office before the date the election was annulled shall be taken into account”.
Recall that Sylva’s first election in 2007 was nullified and he contested again in the rerun and won in 2008. Thus, by the provision of the constitution above, he has spent fire years as a Governor and any other tenure of four years will make his time as Governor to be 9 years.
Also, there’s a precedent of a similar case in the Supreme Court which is case of Marwa Vs. Nyako for Adamawa governorship election in 2008. In that judgement, the apex court stated that nobody should be voted for as Governor more than two times.
Another uncontroverted issue against Sylva is that he has taken oath of office twice for the same position on different occasions.
The coming days will either affirm the position of the constitution and previous supreme court ruling on this matter or set a new record, after all, Ahmed Lawan is in the 10th senate without participating in any known primary election of his party.
