The Presidential Election Petitions Tribunal, on Wednesday, upheld the election of President Bola Tinubu as the winner of the February 25 presidential election.
The five-man panel of the Tribunal which was led by Justice Haruna Tsammani struck out the petitions filed by the APM, LP and PDP against the declaration of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu by INEC as winner of the 2023 presidential election.
According to a statement signed by the Special Adviser to the President on Media & Publicity, Ajuri Ngelale, President Tinubu welcomes the judgment and calls for collective efforts to build the nation.
“President Tinubu welcomes the judgment of the Tribunal with an intense sense of solemn responsibility and preparedness to serve all Nigerians, irrespective of all diverse political persuasions, faiths, and tribal identities.
“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.”
The presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, Atiku Abubakar and his Labour Party counterpart, Peter Obi have rejected Wednesday’s judgment of the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal affirming the election of President Bola Tinubu.
Atiku’s Lead Counsel, Chris Uche, SAN, said he had received instructions from his client to file an appeal at the Supreme Court.
He said “The judgment has been delivered but we have not received justice. Luckily, the law has given us leverage to go on appeal to the Supreme Court. We have instructions from our clients to go to the Supreme Court. The struggle continues.”
Candidate of the Labour Party, Mr. Peter Obi vowed to appeal the judgement of the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal, that upheld the election of President Bola Tinubu.
Speaking through his team of lawyers led by Dr. Livy Uzoukwu, SAN, Obi, said: “If we are not careful, our electoral jurisprudence will eventually disappear. I am saying this with every amount of sincerity because when the litigant, when those that contested election continue to find it very difficult to establish their case due to obstacles on the way, starting by INEC, certainly they may resort to some other means of trying to get justice, which may not be lawful.
“Also, I commend the Court of Appeal for introducing live streaming. You may recall that we applied to the court to have live streaming of all the proceedings, the court, in its wisdom did not grant the application.
“But now, in the end, they saw wisdom in it and the need to guarantee transparency, hence, live streaming of the judgement.
“Certainly, it would have been better if it was live streaming of the entire proceedings so that the public will have the chance of watching and be able to relate properly with the judgement.
“So, I will hope and pray that this time, it will be continuous, starting from the beginning of a case.
“That is the only way that you can guarantee transparency because when something is open, Nigerians will see things for themselves and they will make up their minds, one way or the other.”
