A Special Panel of the Court of Appeal sitting at Abuja, has today, 21st August 2023, dismissed the appeal filed by the All Progressives Congress (APC) and Mr. Ekene Raphael Nwankwo against the decision of the National and State House of Assembly Election Tribunal sitting at Enugu.
Recall that following a preliminary objection filed by Hon. Sunday Umeha and his Legal Team against the Petition filed by Ekene Nwankwo and the APC for being statute barred having being filed out of time, the 3-man panel upheld the compelling arguments in the objection and struck out the incompetent Petition.
Aggrieved with the decision, Mr. Nwankwo and the APC appealed to the Court of Appeal seeking to upturn the decision of the Tribunal. However, in delivering judgment on the appeal today, the Court of Appeal struck out the appeal for being equally incompetent and upheld the Preliminary Objection filed by Hon. Sunday Umeha which challenged the competence of the appeal for not being in line with the decision of the lower Tribunal appealed against.
As a penalty for filing the frivolous appeal, the Court awarded cost of N 100,000 against Mr. Nwankwo and his party in favor of Hon. Sunday Umeha and the other Respondents.