The legal train of Senator Abubakar Abdulrahman Railway has again derailed in its move to reclaim his Kogi East Senatorial mandate.
The lawyers who handled his motion before the Abuja Division of the Court of Appeal went off the judicial rail as their argument could not take them to reclaim Senator Railway’s mandate.
The ousted Senator lost his seat in 2015 when he was sacked from the Upper Chamber of the National Assembly by the Supreme Court on grounds that he went into the 2015 general elections without passing through the primary of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
Since then, Railway has always gone off the rail in his several legal moves to reach the judicial destination where he could reclaim his lost mandate.
The rerun election that ensued his removal from the Senate by the apex court produced Senator Isaac Alfa of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) as winner. The emergence of Alfa was however not free of controversy, as he was also removed some months into his representation at the Senate by the court following a suit against him by Senator Attai Aidoko who claimed that Alfa was not the winner of the PDP primary that was conducted in Idah in 2014.
Senator Alfa as a result of the legal battle instituted against him by Senator Aidoko, was removed from office in December 2016 and replaced by the latter as Senator of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
But the judicial marathon race did not stop there; Alfa challenged his removal in court up to November 2017 when the court of Appeal sitting in Abuja removed Aidoko and declared the Kogi East Senatorial Seat vacant.
The court had ruled then that the Certificate of Return issued to the sacked Senator was no longer valid and ordered that he should cease from parading himself as a senator of the Federal Republic.
Aidoko was also ordered to pay the sum of one million naira (N1m) as fine for wasting the time of the court.
The leading judge in the Appellate Court, Justice Aboki also added in his ruling in November last year that the Federal High Court would have to determine in one way or the other, who should represent Kogi East between Senator Attai Aidoko and Senator Isaac Mohammed Alfa.
Justice Aboki said the seat would remain vacant pending the determination of the case at the Federal High Court.
It was on the basis of this ruling that the ousted Senator Railway filed a motion before the Appeal Court late last year to reclaim his lost mandate.
But the court, Thursday in Abuja, dismissed the motion filed by the former Kogi East Senatorial District lawmaker and declared it a nullity.
Railway was arguing that the seat was not vacant that he was the real winner who was robbed of his status through unfair adjudication.
He further argued that the Attorney General of the federation had directed the electoral body (INEC) to issue him the certificate of return confirming him as the rightful occupant of the seat and the original winner of the election.
Nevertheless, Abdulrahman’s rightful claim to the seat failed, as the judge, Justice Datti of the Abuja court of Appeal dismissed the motion for lack of merit.
Credit: InsideStory
