As the Presidential Election Petition Court, PEPC,
kick-starts hearing on Monday, the People’s Democratic Party, PDP, and its
candidate, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, have filed an application for an order to
allow live coverage of day-to-day proceedings on the case they brought against
the President-elect, Bola Tinubu.
Atiku, who came second in the presidential election that
held on February 25, in the motion he filed through his team of lawyers led by
Chief Chris Uche, SAN, specifically applied for; “An order, directing the
Court’s Registry and the parties on modalities for admission of Media
Practitioners and their Equipments into the courtroom”.
The PDP candidate and former Vice President contended that
the petition he lodged against the President-elect, was “a matter of national
concern and public interest”.
He argued that the case involved citizens and electorates in
the 36 States of the Federation and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, who
he said voted and participated in the presidential poll.
More so, he drew attention of the court to the fact that the
International Community is equally interested on issues pertaining to Nigeria’s
electoral process.
In the motion dated May 5, Atiku and the PDP insisted that
their case against Tinubu, being a unique electoral dispute with a peculiar
constitutional dimension, they said it was a matter of public interest in which
millions of Nigerian citizens and voters are stakeholders, with the
constitutional right to be part of the proceedings.
“An integral part of the constitutional duty of the Court to
hold proceedings in public is a discretion to allow public access to
proceedings either physically or by electronic means.
“With the huge and tremendous technological advances and
developments in Nigeria and beyond, including the current trend by this
Honourable Court towards embracing electronic procedures, virtual hearing and
electronic filing, a departure from the Rules to allow a regulated televising
of the proceedings in this matter is in consonance with the maxim that justice
must not only be done, but must be seen to be done.
“Televising court proceedings is not alien to this
Honourable Court, and will enhance public confidence”, the petitioners added.
Atiku had in his joint petition with the PDP, marked:
CA/PEPC/05/2023, applied for the withdrawal of the Certificate of Return that
was issued to Tinubu of the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, by the
Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC.
He maintained that the declaration of Tinubu as winner of
the presidential election was “invalid by reason of non- compliance with the
provisions of the Electoral Act, 2022”.
Atiku further argued that Tinubu’s election was invalid by
reason of corrupt practices.
“The 2nd Respondent was not duly elected by majority of
lawful votes cast at the Election.
“The 2nd Respondent was at the time of the Election not
qualified to contest the Election”, Atiku added while listing grounds he said
the court should consider to nullify Tinubu’s election.
He prayed the court to declare him winner of the
presidential election, having secured the second highest number of lawful votes
cast at the election.
However, in a reply he filed through his team of lawyers led
by Chief Wole Olanipekun, SAN, Tinubu, queried the legal competence of
petitions seeking to invalidate his election victory.
In a preliminary objection he entered before the court,
Tinubu, described Atiku as a consistent serial loser that had since 1993,
crisscrossed different political parties, in search of power.
The President-elect said he would during the hearing of the
petition, lead evidence before the court to show how Atiku’s emergence as a
candidate in the presidential election that held on February 25, led to the
“balkanisation” of the opposition PDP.
Insisting that he was validly returned as winner of the
presidential election by INEC, Tinubu told the court that unlike Atiku, he has
been “a most consistent politician, who has not shifted political tendency and
alignment”.
On the claim that he did not secure the statutory vote from
the Federal Capital Territory, FCT, Abuja, Tinubu, argued that it was not a
mandatory requirement of the law that he must win the FCT before he would be
declared as the President-elect.
He said Atiku’s call for his election to be nullified on the
ground that he was mandatorily required to score one-quarter of the lawful
votes cast in each of at least two-thirds of all the States and the FCT,
“becomes suspect and abusive, when considered vis-à-vis relief 150(d), where
the petitioners pray that the 1st petitioner who did not score one-quarter of
the votes cast in more than 21 States and the FCT, Abuja, be declared the
winner of the election and sworn in as the duly elected President of Nigeria”.
It will be recalled that INEC had on March 1, announced
Tinubu as the winner of the presidential poll, ahead of 17 other candidates
that contested the election.
It declared that Tinubu scored a total of 8,794,726 votes to
defeat Atiku who polled a total of 6,984,520 votes and Obi who came third with
a total of 6,101,533 votes.
Aside from Atiku and the PDP, the Labour Party, LP, and its
own candidate, Mr. Peter Obi, who came third at the election, are equally
before the court to nullify Tinubu’s election.
A three-member panel of the PEPC which will conduct its
proceedings at the Court of Appeal in Abuja, will on Monday, commence
pre-hearing session on all the petitions that were brought before it by
aggrieved presidential candidates and their political parties.
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