The Court of Appeal in Abuja has granted leave to Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), and Peter Obi of the Labor Party (LP), to inspect documents used by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), for the conduct of the February, 25 Presidential elections.
The permission was sequel to two separate exparte applications filed by Abubakar and Obi, who came second and third in the presidential election won by Senator Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress, (APC).
Abubakar and Obi are alleging substantial non-compliance with the Electoral Act, 2022, in addition to violence and rigging which they claimed marred the conduct and outcome of the election.
Atiku’s claim
Legal counsel to Atiku Abubakar, Adedamola Faloku argued that the application which was predicated on six grounds, sought for seven reliefs, adding that a schedule of the documents to interrogate the respondent [INEC] was also contained in the application supported by a 12 paragraph affidavit.
Mr Falolu adopted all the averments contained in the affidavit and urged the court to grant the application.
Obi declares the result as daylight robbery
In Peter Obi’s case, the defendants in the suit are INEC, Bola Tinubu and the APC.
Obi accused the Chairman of INEC, Prof Mahmood Yakubu of violating essential provisions of the 2022 Electoral Act on the transmission of results from the polling units to the INEC viewing center.
Obi declared the results as a daylight robbery, and vowed to do everything legally possible to reclaim the mandate.
Legal counsel to Obi, Alex Ejeseme prayed the appellate court to grant the reliefs sought in the motion exparte in the interest of justice.
After listening to the applicants, the Presiding Judge, Justice Joseph Ikyegh granted the request of the two applicants.
6 states call for cancellation of presidential election results
Similarly, six states of the federation have taken the federal government before the Supreme Court; seeking cancellation of the February 25, 2023 Presidential and National Assembly elections.
The six states who instituted the suit through their Attorney-General’s are; Adamawa, Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa, Delta, Edo and Sokoto.
The suit was filed in pursuant to section 6(6) 14(3) 153(2) and 252 of the 1999 Constitution and inherent jurisdiction of the apex court.
They are asking the Supreme Court to invoke relevant provisions of the law to annul the poll based on alleged irregularities and malpractices.
Among other things, the plaintiffs urged the apex court to declare, that the Federal Government of Nigeria, through INEC was bound to electronically transmit or transfer Polling Unit Results in Form EC8A using BVAS by uploading scanned copies of the said unit result to the Independent National Electoral Commission Result Viewing Portal (IReV), in the course of the General Elections held on February 25, 2023.
INEC on Wednesday, declared Bola Tinubu of the APC, as winner of the poll, with a total of 8,794,726 votes, while Atiku Abubakar (PDP) had 6,984,520 and Peter Obi scored 6,101,533 votes.
Reporting by Ifeoma Nwovu; Editing by Marian Benjamin, Muzha Kucha and Annabel Nwachukwu