The Presidential Election Petitions Court has scheduled a hearing on Monday to hear petitions contesting the declaration of All Progressives Congress candidate Bola Tinubu as the president-elect.
With this development, the anticipated legal battle between contenders contesting the conclusion of the 2023 presidential election will begin on May 8.
On Tuesday, the All Progressives Congress’s National Legal Adviser, Ahmad El-Marzuq, confirmed the date.
He stated that the APC legal staff had been briefed and that the party was prepared to defend its mandate.
“We have been briefed on the upcoming hearing next week.” But who said the election petitions to the tribunal had to be resolved by May 29?
“Are you saying that if they are not completed before President Buhari leaves office, the government should be dissolved and the president-elect should not be sworn in?” It is not required,” he said in response to a question about how long it would take to decide the petitions.
In addition, a top official of the electoral petitions tribunal confirmed that the hearings would begin on Monday.
Monday’s hearings
”The Presidential election tribunal has established Monday, May 8th as the date for the hearing of the petitions disputing the victory of the President-elect, Bola Tinubu,” he added, speaking on condition of anonymity because he was not licenced to divulge the information.
Tayo Oyetibo SAN, a member of Tinubu’s legal team, also stated that the hearing would begin next week.
“Yes, the hearing is on Monday, but it’s for a pre-hearing session,” Oyetibo told our correspondent on Tuesday. The purpose of the hearing is to determine whether any applications have been filed before the main hearing begins. The hearing of the substantive matters will be scheduled.”
According to the findings, the court stopped receiving responses from the petitioners on April 23.
The Independent National Electoral Commission’s Chairman, Mahmood Yakubu, declared Tinubu the president-elect on March 1 after his party received the majority of votes cast.
The former Lagos state governor received 8.8 million votes, defeating Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party, who received 6.9 million votes, Peter Obi of the Labour Party, who received 6.1 million votes, and 15 others.
Dissatisfied with the outcome, Atiku and Obi filed separate petitions asking for the election to be annulled or for them to be declared the winners.
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The PDP presidential contender urged the Presidential Election Tribunal to declare him the president-elect, basing his seven pleas on five grounds.
Alternatively, Atiku asked the court to cancel the election and hold a new one because of alleged irregularities in thousands of polling units on February 25.
The petition was submitted before the Presidential Election Petition Court by a team of experienced lawyers led by Joe-Kyari Gadzama, SAN.
In their 66-page appeal, Atiku and his party stated that as of March 1, when Tinubu was declared the winner of the election, INEC had not transferred and uploaded the whole results and accreditation data from polling units.
Obi, who finished third in the race, said that the poll was marred by several irregularities, including Tinubu and his running companion, Kashim Shettima, being disqualified to compete.
He further claimed that Tinubu failed to acquire a majority of the valid votes cast in the election, as well as one-quarter of the lawful votes cast in the FCT.
He further claimed that the election was conducted in flagrant violation of the law.
A group of the Action Alliance is also asking the tribunal to overturn Tinubu’s election as president-elect.
The Action Alliance and its presidential candidate based their petition on INEC’s refusal to upload the name of their candidate, Solomon-David Okanigbuan, on its February election webpage.
The AA and Okanigbuan, as co-petitioners, stated in their petition filed on March 16 that despite existing court judgements recognising Okanigbuan as the legitimate presidential standard-bearer, the election umpire instead uploaded the name of Hamza Al-Mustapha.
INEC had approved Al-Mustapha, a former chief security officer under the late dictator Sani Abacha, as AA’s presidential candidate for the election.
It claimed that the ex-Lagos senator’s triumph would be null and void due to the “flawed process” of nominating his vice presidential nominee, Shettima.
The Alliance People’s Movement claimed in a petition stamped CA/PEPC/04/2023 that the president-elect was unqualified to run for office.
Analysts viewed Tinubu’s actions as an attempt to beat INEC’s deadline for presidential candidates to submit names of their vice presidential nominees on June 17, 2022.
However, in its responses, the APC asked the PEPC to dismiss the petitions filed by the opposition parties.
It called the former vice president’s suit challenging his election victory “a gross abuse of court processes.”
Tinubu asked the court to dismiss the entire petition in a preliminary objection designated CA/PEPC/05/2023, filed by his team of attorneys led by Chief Wole Olanipekun, SAN.
He stated that he lost the PDP presidential primary election to President Goodluck Jonathan in 2011 and the APC primary election to President Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.) in 2015.
Tinubu claimed that in 2019, Atiku lost the presidential election to Buhari again, and that he will do so again in 2023.
According to the president-elect, the electorate’s rejection of the first petitioner at the presidential election votes on February 25 was not a surprise or an accident.
He stated that he was prepared to present evidence to the court to show that a number of PDP-controlled states and their governors rejected Atiku’s election as the party’s nominee and promised never to support his campaign.
Tinubu, in a preliminary objection filed alongside his Vice-President-elect in response to Obi’s petition, claimed that the LP standard bearer lacked the jurisdiction to dispute his election victory.
He claimed that Obi was not properly nominated to run in the presidential election as required by articles 77(2) and (3) of the Electoral Act of 2022.
He argued that Obi’s name did not appear on the LP’s membership list, noting that he defected from the PDP less than 30 days before the primary election that produced him as a presidential candidate.
He also accused Obi of hopping from one political party to the another, claiming that the LP had the necessary organisation to win the presidential election.
Tinubu attributed his presidential victory to his consistency and track record of success in public service, which endeared him to millions of electorates across the federation.
The president-elect also disputed the AA’s assertion that its presidential candidate was barred from running in the election, claiming that its known candidate, Mr Al-Mustapha, ran.
The APC contended in a preliminary objection to the APM’s petition that “the petitioner (APM) alone cannot benefit and had no special interest in the election or return of the third respondent (Tinubu) as the winner of the election.”
The APC questioned the party’s legal standing to dispute the method it used to nominate its candidate.
The APC further claimed that because the APM was not a party member, it did not know “how it becomes the petitioner’s business how it nominates its candidates.”
The APC went on to say that Okanigbuan (the 2nd petitioner) “is not the 1st petitioner’s AA’s validly nominated and sponsored candidate to contest the presidential elections held on Feb. 25.”
