PEPT Affirms Tinubu’s Election After Dismissing Atiku’s Petition, LP Rejects Judgement, Tinubu Welcomes Verdicts

The Presidential Election Petition Court has affirmed Bola Tinubu as the validly elected President of Nigeria. Haruna Tsammani, the head of the five-member panel of the court who delivered the lead judgement, made the pronouncement after dismissing the petition of Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

Atiku’s case was the third and last of the petitions, aimed at the credibility of the 25 February presidential election, to be dismissed by the court in its record 12 hour-long judgement on Wednesday.

The court earlier dismissed the petitions by Labour Party’s Peter Obi and the All Peoples Movement (APM).

Mr Tsammani held that the three petitions were not proved.

The three petitions alleged among others, non-qualification of Mr Tinubu to run for the presidency, irregularities and corrupt practices during the election, and failure of Mr Tinubu to meet full constitutional requirements to be declared the winner of the election due to his inability to secure 25 per cent of the votes in Abuja, the federal capital.

The court resolved all the issues formulated for determination of the cases against the petitioners and in favour of Mr Tinubu and the other respondents.

The court ruled that none of the allegations were proved with credible evidence.

So far, two members of the panel – Stephen Adah and Misitura Bolaji-Yusuf, have adopted the reasoning and conclusions in the lead judgement.

Their opinions concurring with the lead judgement already constitute the court’s majority decision while the two remaining judges – Moses Ugo and Abbah Mohammed – await their turns to deliver their own opinions.

Ms Bolaji-Yusuf was still delivering the full details of her opinion as of the time of filing this report at 9.21 p.m

‘Atiku’s dual Citizenship Petition Against Tinubu Struck Out’

Moving on to the PDP and Atiku, the Tribunal struck out the petitioners’ case alleging that Tinubu owns dual citizenship and so should be disqualified from the poll.

The panel also struck out the evidence of some of Atiku’s witnesses on the grounds that that their witness statements on oath were not filed along with his petition.

The court also expunged 37 exhibits tendered by the witnesses from the court’s records.

On the issue of dumping of documents on the court, he held that this would only go to the weight to be attached to such evidence.

On the issue of Tinubu’s conviction and the issue of his dual citizenship, the Tribunal again held like it earlier did that this issues were incompetent and liable to be struck out and same were indeed struck out.

On the inability of the election officers to transmit, of the 27 witnesses called by the petitioner, 10 were polling unit agents who testified as to how the elections were conducted in their different polling unit.

All 10 of the witnesses testified that the voting went well and was peaceful in their different polling units but they all said they could not upload results electronically to the portal of INEC, so they entered the results manually and took same to the ward and or state collation center.

The witnesses were emphatic that voting went well, party agents signed the results but the only difficulty was in uploading the results electronically.

The Tribunal strongly stressed that litigation is fought on pleadings, parties swim or sink on their pleadings.

On the allegations that agents of the respondents disrupted the elections, the petitioners said video recordings will be tendered as proof but this was not done.

Issue two was on the 25 percent in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) and the court simply adopted its earlier decision on the issue.

Issue three was on the qualification of the Tinubu because of the alleged indictment but the petitioners did not place believable evidence before the court.

Related: PEPT Strikes Out Peter Obi Petition Against Tinubu’s Victory

LP Rejects Tribunal’s Judgments

In a swift reaction, the Labour Party rejected the judgments of the Tribunal.

In a statement after the verdict of the Tribunal on Wednesday, LP’s National Publicity Secretary, Obiora Ifoh, said justice was not served in the petitions of the party against the APC and Tinubu.

He also said the Labour Party will make its next move known upon consultation with its lawyers after receiving the Certified True Copy of the judgments.

The party said the judgment of the court “did not reflect the law and the desire of the people”.

“Nigerians were witnesses to the electoral robbery that took place on February 25, 2023, which was globally condemned but the Tribunal in its wisdom refused to accept the obvious,” the statement partly read.

“What is at stake is democracy and we will not relent until the people will prevail.

“We salute the doggedness of our team of lawyers who fearlessly exposed the wrath in our system. We can only weep for democracy in Nigeria but we refuse to give up on Nigeria.

“Details of the party’s position will be presented after consultation with our lawyers after the Certified True Copy of the judgment is made available to us.”

Tinubu Welcomes Verdict, Woos Atiku, Obi

Meanwhile, Tinubu, on Wednesday night welcomed the Tribunal’s verdict affirming his election, and called on Atiku and Obi to join hands with his government.

“The President believes the Presidential Candidates and Political Parties that have lawfully exercised their rights by participating in the 2023 general elections and the judicial process, which followed, have affirmed Nigeria’s democratic credentials,” said presidential spokesman, Ajuri Ngelale, in a statement.

“The President urges his valiant challengers to inspire their supporters in the trust that the spirit of patriotism will now and forever be elevated above partisan considerations, manifesting into support for our Government to improve the livelihood of all Nigerians.”