An attempt by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu and the All Progressives Congress (APC) to stop the Allied People’s Movement (APM) in its petition challenging his qualification for the February 25, 2023, presidential election was on Monday rejected by the Presidential Election Petition Court (PEPC).
Tinubu, through his lead counsel, Chief Wole
Olanipekun SAN, had sought to use a Supreme Court judgment delivered on May 26,
2023, to terminate the APM’S petition, but the request was turned down.
The grouse of Tinubu was that the Apex Court
had resolved the sole issue raised in the petition of the APM in the judgment
in a suit filed by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).
He sought to move the Court to invoke the
spirit and letters of the Supreme Court judgment to halt the hearing into the
APM’s petition.
The Presiding Justice of the Court, Justice
Haruna Simon Tsammani, however, disagreed with Tinubu and held that the party
cannot be shut out in the face of fair hearing.
Justice Tsammani asked Tinubu to keep his
objections against the hearing of the petition to the final address stage of
the court’s proceedings.
Similar objections raised by APC through its
counsel, Charles Edosomwen SAN, against the petition on the same ground were
turned down by PEPC for the same reason.
Earlier, the APM, through its lawyer, Mr
Gideon Ijiagbonya, had informed the Court of receipt of the Supreme Court
judgment being sought to be used to terminate its petition.
The lawyer said that upon perusal of the
judgment by the Supreme Court, he and his legal team concluded that there is
life in the petition and applied for its hearing.
He, however, sought adjournment till June 26
to enable him to obtain a vital document from the Independent National
Electoral Commission (INEC) to establish his case.
Justice Tsammani, in a brief ruling, rejected
a week-long adjournment and fixed Wednesday, June 21, for the hearing of the
petition.
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