With various groups across the country pushing for former President Goodluck Jonathan to contest in 2027 and campaigns to extend the tenure of Ondo State Governor Lucky Aiyedatiwa gaining traction ahead of 2028,  and  explore the possibility of their eligibility

Plots to draft former President Dr. Goodluck Jonathan into the 2027 presidential race are thickening in the northern region. Already, scores of groups have reportedly held several meetings and sensitisation tours to gauge the mood in key northern states, citing Jonathan’s perceived record as a unifier and a “leader who sacrificed personal ambition to protect Nigeria’s democracy.”

But the question is: Having taken the oath of office twice, is he legally eligible to run for president in 2027 if he succumbs to pressure to contest?

Before the 2015 elections, the issue was raised by various groups and individuals who were against Jonathan. But he won all the various suits filed to challenge his eligibility.

For instance, in the suit filed by one Cyriacus Njoku, a Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) member, that Jonathan’s tenure should count from May 6, 2010 when he was first sworn in on the strength of the doctrine of necessity activated by the National Assembly, Justice Mudashiru Oniyangi of a Federal Capital Territory High Court dismissed the prayer of the plaintiff and declared that President Jonathan’s tenure commenced on May 29, 2011, when he was sworn in after winning the presidential election and not earlier.

When Njoku approached the Court of Appeal, it also cleared the coast for the then president to seek a re-election.

In a unanimous judgment, the panel of justices maintained that the first oath Jonathan took on May 6, 2010, was only to enable him to complete the un-expired tenure of the late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adua as stipulated in Section 146(1) of the Constitution, maintaining that his first tenure as substantive President of Nigeria commenced on May 29, 2011, when he was administered the second oath of office.

In another suit filed by Richard Mneaga and Shuaibu Lill, seeking to bar him from seeking re-election in the 2015 at the Federal High Court in Kaduna, Justice Evelyn Anyadike struck out the suit, saying the plaintiffs lacked the locus standi to drag the president to court based on section 308 of the Constitution which gives him immunity not to sue or be sued.

However, in 2018, President Muhammadu Buhari signed into law a bill passed by the National Assembly, which stipulates that a person who assumes the office of the president or governor to complete the tenure of an elected president or governor due to death, resignation, impeachment, or permanent incapacity, is only eligible to be elected to that office for one additional term of four years.

The amendment, now referred to as the Fourth Alteration Act, which became effective on June 7, 2018, included sub-section 3 to sections 137 and 182 as a disqualifying factor.

Section 137(3) and 182 (3) provide: “A person who was sworn in to complete the term for which another person was elected as president shall not be elected to such office for more than a single term.”

The provisions ignited huge debates when it was rumoured in 2022 that Dr. Jonathan would contest the 2023 presidential election.

Former Bayelsa State Governor Timipre Sylva and Ondo State Governor, Lucky Aiyedatiwa, found themselves in a similar situation.

Senior lawyers like Femi Falana (SAN), Prof. Yemi Akinseye-George (SAN), Reverend John Baiyeshea (SAN), Professor Konyinsola Ajayi SAN, Prof. Mike Ozekhome (SAN), Mr. Dayo Akinlaja (SAN) and Chief Akinlolu Kehinde (SAN) have all argued for and against the effects of the amendment on Jonathan and now Aiyedatiwa’s eligibility to further contest elections.

While Falana, Akinseye-George, Baiyeshea and Konyinsola felt that Jonathan can no longer contest any presidential election, Ozekhome, Kehinde and Akinlaja contended that the new provisions cannot be applied retrospectively to bar Jonathan, who entered his tenure before the law took effect. They argued that the law cannot be applied retroactively.

All the lawyers, however, agreed that the Ondo State governor, Aiyedatiwa, is ineligible to run for another term based on Section 137(3) in the Fourth Alteration of the 1999 Constitution.

For the former Chairman of the National Human Rights Commission, Professor Chidi Anselm Odinkalu, though the issue appears uncertain over Jonathan’s eligibility, he stated categorically that the Ondo State governor is caught by the new amendment.

The position held by Ozekhome, Dr. Reuben Atabo (SAN) and others was upheld in a judgment delivered on May 27, 2022, by a Federal High Court in Yenagoa, Bayelsa State.

The judgment was given by Justice Isa Hamma Dashen on a suit, marked: FHC/YNG/CS/86/2022, filed by Andy Solomon and Idibiye Abraham (who claimed to be members of the APC).

Justice Dashen held, among others, that Section 137(3) of the constitution did not bar Jonathan from contesting the 2023 presidential election because the provision could not be applied retroactively.

The judge held that Section 137(3), which came into effect on June 7, 2018, “cannot apply retrospectively, except the Legislature, in clear terms, expressly stated their intention for it to be so.”

The judge also referenced an earlier judgment by the Court of Appeal in Abuja delivered on March 3, 2015, in an appeal by Cyriacus Njoku, who said he was a member of the PDP. The judgment resolved the question about Jonathan’s eligibility in the face of the provision of Section 137(1)(b) of the constitution.

Section 137(1)(b) provides that: “A person shall not be qualified for election to the office of President if he has been elected to such office at any two previous elections.”

In Sylva’s case, he was first elected governor in 2007. But in 2008, his victory was annulled by the Court of Appeal, which ordered the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to conduct a fresh election within 90 days. The court also ordered that he should hand over to the Speaker of the House of Assembly, Werinipre Seibarugo, as acting governor. When the election was re-conducted, Sylva won again and was sworn in for the second time. When he sought re-election against Seriake Dickson, he lost.

In 2023, as Sylva was about to contest another election, one Demesuoyefa Kolomo, who claimed to be a registered voter and a member of the APC, sought Sylva’s disqualification on the grounds that he had been sworn in as governor in 2007 and 2008.

In his October 9, 2023 judgment, Justice Okorowo upheld Kolomo’s case.

Relying on the Supreme Court’s decision in the case of Marwa vs Nyako, the judge held that the drafters of the constitution stated that nobody should be voted for as governor more than twice and that the parties to the suit agreed that Sylva had been voted into office two times.

But, in its October 31, 2023 judgment on the appeal, marked: CA/ABJ/CV/1061/2023 filed by Sylva, a three-member panel of the Court of Appeal held that the Federal High Court, Abuja lacked the jurisdiction to have heard and determined the case filed by Kolomo.

The court held that, having not been an aspirant who participated in APC’s governorship primary, Kolomo lacked the locus standi to approach the court to challenge the nomination of the party’s candidate.

For Aiyedatiwa, following the death of Governor Rotimi Akeredolu, as deputy governor, he was sworn in as governor on December 27, 2023, to complete the tenure. However, in November 2024, he contested, won and was sworn in again in February 2025.

But a lawyer, who is in support of another term for Aiyedatiwa, Shola Elekan, argued that Aiyedatiwa’s election as deputy governor in 2020 is constitutionally distinct from the office of governor, adding that it does not count as one of the two elections referenced in Section 182(1)(b).

 “The legal question is whether this ambition violates Section 182(1)(b) of the 1999 Constitution or any provision of the Electoral Act 2022. It is my firm legal conclusion that Governor Aiyedatiwa is fully eligible to contest for another term because he was not elected as governor twice as stipulated in Section 182(1)(b) of the 1999 Constitution (as amended).”

In 2010, then Governors Sylva, Ibrahim Idris, Aliyu Wammako, Murtala Nyako and Liyel Imoke, who were elected in 2007 but had their election nullified, and won re-election in 2008, approached the Federal High Court in Abuja in 2010, claiming that their tenure began to count from when they assumed office upon winning the rerun election.

Justice Adamu Bello, in a judgment on February 24, 2011, held that the tenure of the governors legally started in 2008 when they took fresh oaths of office and allegiance following the nullification of their April 14, 2007 elections by the courts.

 INEC appealed the judgment at the Court of Appeal in Abuja and lost, prompting it to appeal to the Supreme Court.

In January 2012, the Supreme Court, in its judgment, set aside the concurrent decisions of the two lower courts and ordered the five governors to vacate office on the grounds that their tenure could not be extended beyond the four years allowed by the constitution.

 In the lead judgment of a seven-member panel of the apex court, Justice Walter Onnoghen (as he then was) said: “I hold the considered view that since the acts performed during the period prior to the nullification of the election remain valid and subsisting and the same person contested and won the re-run election thereby taking another set of oaths and since what was nullified was the election, the oaths they took on May 29, 2007 remains valid.”a