Presidential Poll: Obi, Atiku to know fate as tribunal delivers verdict Wednesday

By Ikechukwu Nnochiri, Abuja

The Presidential Election Petition Court, PEPC, (tribunal) sitting in Abuja, will on Wednesday, deliver judgment on petitions seeking to nullify President Bola Tinubu’s election.

The two petitions, marked CA/PEPC/05/2023 and CA/PEPC/03/2023, were brought before the court by a former Vice President and candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, as well as the candidate of the Labour Party, LP, Mr. Peter Obi, respectively.

The Justice Haruna Tsammani-led five-member panel of the court had on August 1, okayed the cases for judgment, after all the parties adopted their final briefs of argument.

While adopting their final written address, Atiku and the PDP, through their team of lawyers led by Chief Chris Uche, SAN, urged the court to declare that President Tinubu was not qualified to contest the presidential poll that was held on February 25.

They prayed the presidential election tribunal to nullify the entire outcome of the presidential election and order a re-run or fresh contest.

Atiku…

Atiku and his party alleged that the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, despite receiving over N355 billion for the conduct of the election, deliberately bypassed all the technological innovations it introduced for the purpose of the 2023 general elections.

They contended before the presidential tribunal that INEC acted in breach of the amended Electoral Act, when it refused to electronically transmit the results of the presidential election.

“On the issue of transmission of election results based on new provisions in the Electoral Act, we are all in agreement, including the INEC, that there is a new regime in election management.

“The essence of the innovation was to enhance transparency in the collation of results, which was an area that we usually had problems and not the actual election, and secondly, to enhance the integrity of result declared.

“We agree that INEC had an option and we brought video evidence by the INEC Chairman showing that the electoral body indeed chose an option.