On Tuesday, the Appeal Court in Akure dismissed the lawsuit brought by Senator Nicholas Tofowomo, the lawmaker for the Ondo South Senatorial District, against Hon. Agboola Ajayi, a former deputy governor of the state and the PDP candidate for the Ondo South Senatorial District.
Justice Ayobode Olujimi Lokulo-Sodipe ruled that the lawsuit was dismissed because the appellant had missed the legal deadline of 14 days.
The judge dismissed the appeal with a fine of N250.000.00 against Tofowomo after finding that the appellant’s inability to file the lawsuit within 14 days of the cause of action rendered the case and the appeal nugatory.
In light of the appellant’s inability to file within the legal deadline, Lokulo-Sodipe upheld the Federal High Court’s decision declaring Ajayi the party’s candidate.
In his ruling, the court upheld the Federal High Court Justice Rilwanu Aikawa’s dismissal of Senator Tofowomo’s lawsuit contesting the nomination of Ajayi as the PDP candidate.
After scoring 74 points as opposed to Ajayi’s 78 points in the party’s primary, Tofowomo, who was unhappy with the results, went to the Federal High Court through his attorney, Femi Emodamori.
Tofowomo sued Ajayi under the case number FHC/CS/AK/ 83 /2022 on July 5, 2022, alleging that Ajayi had engaged in perjury and an educational scandal. He asked the court to throw out the former deputy governor’s nomination due to his dubious academic records submitted for the election, but he also asked the court to declare him the contest’s victor because Ajayi lacked the necessary qualifications.
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However, Ajayi claimed, via his attorney Prof. Kayode Olatoke SAN, that the allegations of perjury against him are unfounded and that the school registrar who was present when he wrote his WAEC had signed an affidavit in 2006 to clear him of the contentious mistake regarding his date of birth on the document.
Ajayi further asserted that the case was filed outside of the legal window of time and that the court lacked jurisdiction to hear it because it was merely an academic exercise and a waste of time in court.
In his decision issued in October, Justice Aikawa stated that the Supreme Court had concluded that the date of the incident should be used to assess the case’s status rather than the date the plaintiff became aware of the infraction.
According to Justice Aikawa, the cause of action arose on June 9, 2022, and the case was filed on July 5, 2022.
Unhappy with the decision, Tofowomo appealed the court’s ruling and requested that the case be retried since the merits should have taken precedence over the procedural tricks used by the trial court.
The electoral act, practice direction, and constitution all set deadlines for when such a challenge should be filed, therefore the appellate court’s decision to dismiss Tofowomo’s appeal was based on the fact that the case could not be reviewed on the merits.
