The appeal court in Calabar, Cross River State upheld the conviction, awarding Professor Peter Ogban for tampering with the results of the 2019 Akwa Ibom Northwest Senate election to benefit Sen. Goldsville Akpabio.
The Court of Appeal held on Wednesday’s decision to hold the High Court sitting in Ikot Ekpene, Akwa Ibom State, which ruled that Ogban had committed Ogban crimes.
The court took a firm stance on Ogban’s misconduct, highlighting the severity of his academic status and public trust in him during the election process.
Professor Ogban, a scholar of soil physics at the University of Calaba, served as a return officer in the Senate poll. He prosecuted in the prosecution of the Independent National Election Commission (INEC), and his findings were that he manipulated the collation of numbers to favor the then-Niger Delta affairs, Akpabio.
Ogban was convicted of forgery of results in order to bring Akpabio against his opponent, Christopher Ekpenyong (PDP) of the People’s Democratic Party.
Akpabio denies misconduct in the election.
The investigation and legal proceedings that led to Ogban’s conviction were led by former INEC resident election commissioner Mike Igini at Akwa Ibom barrister.
His efforts led to the prosecution of two scholars, Professor Ogban and Professor Ignatius Uduk, whose role in announcing the shaped election results. The Court of Appeal’s ruling now cements one of these landmark convictions.
In related developments, Professor Ignatius Uduk of UYO University was sentenced to three years in prison by UYO’s state high court in February and three years in prison for perjury and for pronounced forgery results in the 2019 general election. UDUK served as the return officer for the Essien Udim state constituency vote.
In addition to the detention period, the court also fined 100,000.
The UDUK case is the second major conviction of the professor of electoral misconduct in Nigeria. He was initially arraigned in December 2020 after being arrested in November of that year due to multiple failures to attend court hearings.
Although he pleaded not guilty to three charges filed by INEC, the trial suffered several delays, including changes in defense attorneys, and dramatic moments when Uduk collapsed in court during cross-examination.
At one stage of the trial, Uduk accused the prejudice of the chairman of the judge and asked the judge to withdraw himself. The request has been approved.
The Chief Justice of the State re-signed the case only to return it to the original judge for continuation.
