By; ADAMA JOHN, Lokoja
The President of the Court of Appeal, Justice Monica Dongban-Mensem, has relocated the sitting of the Kogi State Off-cycle Governorship Election Petitions Tribunal from Lokoja to Abuja.
The Secretary of the tribunal, Mr. David Mike announced the relocation in a statement made available to pressmen in Lokoja midweek.
Mike was however, silent on the reason behind the relocation, but a top source at the tribunal said the step was necessitated by “security reasons.”
The change of venue from Lokoja to far away Abuja was not unconnected with the dastardly attack on the Scribe of the Tribunal last Monday in Lokoja by some armed hoodlums in SVU cars who carted away judicial documents from his Peugeot car.
He said the tribunal will now hold its sitting at the National Judicial Institute VB located on Umar Yar’Adua Way, Abuja and advised litigants to take note of the change of venue.
The source said that members of staff of the tribunal had been attacked on several occasions in Lokoja.
“Armed men just pounced on the officials. They robbed them of everything. They took away all the documents that were in the car”
Copies of petitions and personal belongings, official receipts, processes like subpoena, official stamps, were all carted away by the assailants
“Generally, thugs are frustrating the job and the lives of our officials are at stake, making it difficult to work there,” the source said.
It would be recalled that All Progressives Congress (APC) was declared winner of the November 11 off-cycle election, beating the Social Democratic Party (SDP) to a second runner up while the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) clinched the third position.
