The Edo State division of the Court of Appeal has disqualified candidates from the Obaseki faction.
According to the ruling that was issued on Friday, only candidates who won Orbih’s group’s primary election will be eligible to run for office in the general elections in 2023.
Due to the incomplete transmission of data, which rendered the court without jurisdiction to hear the appeal, the court also dismissed an earlier lawsuit that had proclaimed the candidates from the Obaseki group to be legitimate PDP candidates.
Following parallel primaries held by the two factions, the conflict between Obaseki and Orbih over control of the party apparatus in the state assumed a new dimension when the two groups submitted two distinct lists of candidates to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
The Obaseki faction received a favorable ruling when the case initially came up for hearing at the state high court, which eliminated the candidates of the Orbih group and sent the case to the Appeal Court in Benin.
The court’s president declared that the Legacy Group candidates’ appeal was meritorious and therefore approved in Tunde Oyebamiji Awotoye’s decision, which settled four of the six concerns in their favor.
The most recent ruling appears to confirm Orbih’s dominance over the PDP in Edo State