Former President of the Nigerian Bar Association, Olisa Agbakoba (SAN) has reflected on Nigeria’s electoral jurisprudence, citing past presidential election disputes involving former President Muhammadu Buhari as an example of the challenges petitioners face under the law.
Agbakoba spoke during an interview on Sahara TV, where he examined the country’s electoral framework and the difficulty of successfully challenging election results in court. The senior advocate questioned whether the structure of the Electoral Act and judicial interpretations over the years have made it nearly impossible for aggrieved candidates to overturn declared outcomes.
In the interview, he said, “You know Buhari ran four times. The third time the Supreme Court judge, I keep forgetting his name, he is late now, said the way I see the Electoral Act, I don’t see that a petitioner can actually win anything.” Agbakoba suggested that the remark by the late jurist reflected a broader concern about the high evidentiary burden placed on petitioners in election tribunals.
Buhari contested the presidency multiple times before eventually winning in 2015. His earlier bids were followed by legal challenges that went up to the Supreme Court, where the results were upheld. Agbakoba implied that the consistent dismissal of petitions over the years points to structural issues within Nigeria’s electoral dispute resolution process.See_More…