The Supreme Court on Friday, March 10 sacked Senator Ibrahim Shekarau as the candidate of the New Nigerian Peoples Party, NNPP, and then recognized Senator Rufa’i Hanga as the party’s candidate for the 2023 general election.
Previously before, Shekarau had been declared the winner of the 2023 Kano Central Senatorial District election under NNPP after polling 456,787 votes to defeat APC candidate, Alhaji Abdulkarim Zaura, who scored 168,677 votes.
But, the Supreme Court on Friday changed its mind and affirmed the nomination of Hanga as the NNPP’s authentic candidate.
In a unanimous judgment, the five-member panel of the court led by Justice Inyang Okoro had faulted INEC’s refusal to replace Shekarau with Hanga after Shekarau had left the party for PDP before the election.
The court, meanwhile, had upheld the two earlier concurrent judgments by the Federal High Court and the Court of Appeal, affirming Hanga as the authentic candidate of NNPP.