The Ekiti State chapter of the Peoples Democratic Party has raised the alarm over a suspected alliance between judges of the Court of Appeal and the All Progressives Congress.
The party said this followed the emphasis laid on the use of the military during the last governorship election in Ekiti State by the Court of Appeal during its ruling on the governorship election in the state.
The Court had while upholding the election of Governor Ayo Fayose said it was out of place to deploy the military for elections.
The Secretary of the PDP in Ekiti State, Dr. Tope Aluko, in a statement on Tuesday, said the appeal panel deliberately dissipated much energy on the use of military during the election in a manner which has aroused the suspicion of the party.
Aluko said the party will appeal that aspect of the judgement.
He said though the appeal dismissed the petition by the APC against Fayose, “we still find it difficult to understand why a court whose justices dismiss a petition for lack of merit should now go ahead condemning those who made it impossible for the Dr Kayode Fayemi and his party APC to rig the election”.
He added: “To us they have unguarded interest in the area where the use of military to check abuse of the election was discarded by the lower tribunal, it is obvious that they have been compromised for dissipating energy on issue that has been dismissed by the lower tribunal.”
The PDP scribe noted that during the governorship elections in Edo, Ondo, Anambra and Osun States, this same military was maximally used during and after the elections and nobody raised any question because the states were won by other parties.
He said the APC did not go to court then to challenge the use of the military because it favoured it and no judge either at the lower or upper tribunals ever raised eyebrows like the one being suspiciously raised by the justices that ruled on the APC petition against Fayose on Monday.
The statement added: “It has become very glaring that the APC as a party is working out an unholy agenda with the judiciary again as we approach the forthcoming election while some of these judges are believed to be working for them in a conspiracy not to make use of military in the future election for their rigging plan to sail through.
“We want to say emphatically that the use of military in all the elections mentioned including that of Ekiti has been so positive and it has reduced exhibition of violence that used to characterised elections in Nigeria which the APC has applauded and acknowledged whenever it favoured their party.”
Aluko stressed that the Ekiti State election was adjudged to be the fairest, freest and most credible one that has been conducted in the recent time by both local and international observers.
He said it then becomes embarrassing for the justices at the Court of Appeal to be hammering on the same issue that made the peaceful conduct of the election to be possible.