The Supreme Court on Thursday granted the application by the Rivers Attorney General and Speaker to be made defendants in the suit by President Muhammadu Buhari and Abubakar Malami, the Attorney General of the Federation seeking to nullify Section 84 (12) of the Electoral Act 2022.
A seven-man panel of the Justices of the Court led by Justice Musa Dattijo, permitted the joinder application brought by Rivers State through the Speaker of its House of Assembly and its Attorney-General, even as it shifted hearing on the suit till May 26.
Rivers, through its agents, told the court that it was opposed to the suit marked SC/CV/504/2022, which originally had the National Assembly as the sole Respondent.
The court ordered the parties to file and exchange all necessary processes on or before Wednesday next week, while it adjourned the case till Thursday for a hearing.
As the controversy over the Electoral (Amendment) Act 2020 raged, it would be recalled that President Buhari and Malami had gone to the Supreme Court, contending that section 84(12) of the Electoral (Amendment) Act, 2022, is inconsistent with the provisions of sections 42, 65, 66, 106, 107, 131, 137, 147, 151, 177, 182, 192 and 196 of the constitution as well Article 2 of the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights.
The duo, among other things, had sought “a declaration that the joint and or combined reading of Section 65, 66, 106, 107, 131, 137, 147, 151, 177, 182, 192 and 196 of the Constitution, the provision of Section 84 (12) of the Electoral Act, 2022 which also ignores Section 84(3) of the same Act, is an additional qualifying and/or disqualifying factors for the National Assembly, House of Assembly, Gubernatorial and Presidential elections as enshrined in the said constitution, hence unconstitutional, unlawful, null and void”.
“A declaration that having regard to the clear provision of section 1(3) of the Constitution read together with section 4 of the same Constitution, the legislative powers vested in the defendant do not permit or empower it to make any other law prescribing additional qualifying/disqualifying grounds for election to the national assembly, house of assembly, gubernatorial and presidential election outside the express constitutional qualification and disqualification provisions as already provided in each or all of sections 65, 66, 106, 107, 131, 137, 147, 151, 177, 182, 192 and 196 of the 1999 constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended), and without amendment to any of those sections is for the reason of inconsistency, unconstitutional and therefore null and void.
They also prayed to the Supreme Court for “An order nullifying the provision of Section 84 (12) of the Electoral Act, 2022 by application of the blue-pencil rule, for being unconstitutional, illegal, null and void and having been made in excess of the legislative powers of the defendant as enshrined in section 4 of the constitution (as amended).”
