Three court cases, two false declarations: A timeline of Senator Binani’s tumultuous journey in the 2023 polls

Two times she was celebrated on social media for making history as Nigeria’s first elected female governor, two times her hopes were dashed because the announcements were false. In what turned out to be one of the most controversial governorship elections in Nigeria’s history, Senator Aishatu ‘Binani’ Dahiru Ahmed was close to making history as the first woman in Nigerian history to be elected a governor, but a month after a dramatic election and a supplementary poll marked by controversies, fake news and violence, she would have to wait.

The first time the report of her purported victory went viral on the internet on March 19, the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) was yet to announce results of three local government areas in the state. The second time she was declared winner on Sunday, April 16, results from 10 LGAs had not been announced.

A month after the first election, the State Returning Officer, Prof. Mohammed Mele, on Tuesday, April 18, 2023, declared Ahmadu Fintiri, the incumbent governor of Adamawa state and candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), winner of the election, after the collation of results from 10 LGAs.

Mele said Fintiri polled 430,861 votes to defeat his closest rival Binani of the APC who polled 398,788 votes.

Adamawa was one of the states where governorship election held on March 18, 2023, but the election was declared inconclusive by INEC and April 15, 2023, was fixed for a supplementary poll.

There was confusion and violence in the state on Sunday, April 16, 2023, when the Resident Electoral Commissioner of INEC in Adamawa, Hudu Yunusa, in company of some heads of security agencies in the state, declared Binani winner of the election while collation of results from the local government areas were still ongoing. The announcement led to protests and attack on the Returning Officer Prof Mohammed Mele.

In a swift reaction, INEC condemned Yunusa’s action, suspended collation of results in the state and summoned the REC and Returning Officer to Abuja.

INEC said it has suspended the REC and also written to the Inspector General of Police to prosecute him for his action.

The IGP, on Tuesday, April 18, also withdrew the Commissioner of Police in the state and deployed the CP of Gombe State to the state to supervise the poll.

A Timeline of Binani’s Tumultuous Journey to the Polls

From battling with internal crisis in her party – the APC, to a keenly contested governorship election, Binani’s journey in the 2023 elections was full of thorns and spikes.

Binani, 51, is the Senator representing Adamawa Central Senatorial District in the 9th Senate (2019-2023) and Chairperson Senate Committee on Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). She was a member of the House of Representatives from 2011 to 2015 under the platform of the PDP.

The Legal Battles

A graduate of the University of Southampton, Binani defeated Nuhu Ribadu, the pioneer Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) in the APC primaries to emerge the party’s candidate. Not pleased with Binani’s emergence, Ribadu challenged the outcome of the primary election in court, alleging vote buying, over-voting and delegate inducement. He asked the court to disqualify Binani and declare him the APC’s candidate.

In October 2022, a Federal High Court in Yola, Adamawa, nullified the governorship primary that produced Binani, declaring that APC has no candidate for the 2023 governorship election in the state.

In November 2022, an Appeal Court sitting in Yola upturned the ruling of the lower court and upheld Binani’s emergence as APC’s governorship candidate.

The court presided over by Justice Tani Yusuf Hassan set aside the judgement of the Federal High Court which nullified the governorship primary in October.

In December 2022, Ribadu announced that he will not be appealing the judgement at the Supreme Court, putting an end to the intra-party litigation that initially threatened Binani’s candidacy in the 2023 poll.

The Controversial Elections

After the collation of results from 21 LGAs in March 2023 which showed that the incumbent governor was leading with 421,524 votes, against Binani’s 390,275 votes, INEC declared Adamawa gubernatorial poll inconclusive and announced April 15 as new date for a supplementary poll.

INEC said it took the decision due to the margin of votes between the two major candidates which was lower than the number of Permanent Voters’ Cards (PVCs) collected in the areas where election did not hold.

Section 82 of INEC Regulations and Guidelines for the Conduct of Elections says an election shall be declared inconclusive if:

1) The margin of victory between the two leading candidates is less than the total number of canceled votes.

2) The margin of victory between the two leading candidates is less than the number of registered voters in the polling units where elections were not held or results were canceled.

3) There is evidence of widespread violence, rigging, or other irregularities that affected the election outcome.

This provision allows for the declaration of an inconclusive election if the margin between the two leading candidates is less than the total number of registered voters in the polling units where elections were not held, or results were canceled.

Professor Mele, the State’s Returning Officer, said elections were not held in 67 polling units in the state.

“Elections were not held in 47 wards, affecting 69 polling units. So, this gives us a margin of 31,249. The total number of PVCs collected in places where elections were not held amounted to 37,016,” Mele said.

While results from the supplementary poll were being collated on Sunday, April 16, the State Resident Electoral Commissioner Hudu Yunusa Ari, declared Binani as the winner when results from 10 LGAs had not been announced. His declaration, which sparked violence in the state, was contrary to the provisions of Section 25 of the Electoral Act, 2022, which empowers only the returning officer to announce the result and declare the winner of an election at the state collation centre in the case of a governorship election.

In a swift reaction, INEC declared the announcement as null and void and suspended collation of results. A few moments after INEC’s statement nullifying the declaration, Binani addressed a press conference televised live on the federal government-owned NTA, where she read an acceptance speech as the governor-elect.

Back to the Court

On Monday, April 17, 2023, Binani filed an ex-parte application before a Federal High Court in Abuja to stop INEC from taking any further action on the election pending the determination of her application.

She argued that only the Election Petition Tribunal has the power to nullify an election after a winner has been announced.

However, Justice Inyang Ekwo, on Tuesday, ordered Binani’s counsel to address whether or not the court has the requisite jurisdiction to entertain the matter. The court asked the counsel to file the address within three days.

While she waits for the court to decide her fate, INEC has returned Fintiri winner of the election.

Fintiri is not new to dramatic elections. His first election as governor in 2019 was also marked by controversies and declared inconclusive by INEC.

Senator Binani is not the first Nigerian woman to clinch the governorship ticket of a major political party. In 2019, Aisha ‘Mama Taraba‘ Alhassan became the first woman to win the nomination of a major political party but lost the governorship election to the PDP candidate.

Virginia Etiaba, Anambra’s former deputy governor, remains Nigeria’s first and only female governor. She became Anambra state governor in November 2006 when Peter Obi was impeached as the state governor. Etiaba, however, vacated the office when an Appeal Court nullified Obi’s impeachment in February 2007 and ordered his reinstatement.