The Principal of Sultan Abubakar College Sokoto, Muhammed Zayyanu Umar, has tendered 15 documents before the Kebbi State Election Court to claim that the Deputy Governor, who was elected on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Umar Abubakar, did not graduate from the college as he claims.
The Deputy Governor, in the documents he filed at the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), had claimed that he graduated from the College in 1979.
But testifying while being cross-examined by Wale Agunbiade SAN and Yakubu Maikyau SAN, who are counsels to Governor Nasir Idris, and the Deputy governor before the court on Tuesday, the principal tendered 15 documents insisting that no records in the school showed that he was issued any testimonial by the college, adding that Abubakar’s name was not on the list of the 1979 graduates of the college.
The principal is the first subpoenaed witness to be cross-examined by the respondent’s counsels after the tribunal admitted the 15 documents he presented to it.
According to the principal, the name “Umar Abubakar” did not appear in the results of 1979, 1980, 1981, and 1982, adding that no other record(s) in his office as principal of Sultan Abubakar College Sokoto, showed that the deputy governor finished from the school in 1979.
Similarly, a subpoenaed witness and a Director at the Sokoto State Ministry of Education, Abdulsamad Hamzat Yisa told that court that his Ministry had set up a committee to investigate the principal’s claim and the committee confirmed he was right.
The governorship candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), retired Major General Aminu Bande, is challenging the victory of the state governor, Nasiru Idris, and his Deputy, Umar Abubakar in the last general election in Kebbi state.
