Paragraph 48
Service of Notice(1) Where a summons, notice or document, other than a notice or document mentioned in paragraph 7 (1), is required to be served on a person for a purpose connected with an election petition, it may be served by delivering it to the person or by leaving it at his last known place of abode in the constituency with any person there found who is a resident of the abode and appears to be 18 years of age or more.
(2) After a party has given an address for service it shall be sufficient if, in lieu of serving him personally with a document intended for him, the document is served on the person—
(a) appearing on the paper last filed on his behalf as his Solicitor wherever the person may be found or, if the person is not found at his office, on the clerk there apparently in charge; or
(b) named as occupier in his address for service wherever the person may be found or, if the person is not found at the address, on—
(i) the person there found apparently in charge, if such address is a place or business, or
(ii) a person, other than a domestic servant, there found who is a resident of the address and appears to be 18 years of age or more.
(3) A party may change his address for service by giving notice of his new address for service and its occupier to the Secretary and to each party to the election petition, but, until a notice, is received by the Secretary, his old address for service shall continue to be his address for service.
(4) Where service by one of the modes specified in this paragraph has proved impracticable, the Tribunal or Court may, on being satisfied, on an application supported by an affidavit showing what has been done, that all reasonable efforts have been made to effect service—
(a) order that service be effected in any of the ways mentioned in the provisions of the Civil Procedure Rules relating to substituted service which service shall be sufficient; or
(b) dispense with service or notice as the Tribunal or Court deems fit.
i. This paragraph seeks to provide an alternative means of service other than personal service of election petition processes as provided under Paragraph 7.
ii. The paragraph provides for service by delivering or leaving the process at the last known place, house or office in the constituency with any person found there who is a resident of such house or office and appears to be above the age of 18 years.
iii.
The Paragraph also empowers the Registry of the Tribunal to effect service of all processes
on Party to a Petition on the address supplied by such person in his processes filed and
where a
Party changes his address, the service should be effected on the address that appears on the
Notice of Change of Address filed before the Court.
Read Nyesom v. Peterside & Ors (2016) LPELR-48597(CA)
