Court rules March 5 on Obanikoro’s eligibility suit

JUSTICE Kazeem Alogba of a Lagos High Court sitting in Ikeja has fixed March 5, 2015 to deliver judgment in a suit seeking to restrain former Minister of State for Defence, Senator Musiliu Obanikoro, from ever contesting for any electoral office in Nigeria.

  It would be recalled that three members of the People’s Democratic Party (PDP), Micheal Ogun, Suleiman Saheed and Wasiu Odusan instituted the suit before the party’s primary held on December 8, 2014 challenging his eligibility of contesting any position.

  They alleged that the ex-minister at one time or the other falsified his age and had submitted a forged birth certificate to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) for the purpose of contesting governorship election in Lagos State.

  They also prayed the court to determine whether he was still eligible to contest any election in Nigeria having “voluntarily acquired the citizenship of the United States (U.S.) in addition to the citizenship of Nigeria.”

  They filed motion ex-parte aside their originating summons, wherein they urged Justice Alogba to restrain Obanikoro from standing for the PDP governorship primary in Lagos State.