Another Party Petition Court, Asks For Nullification Tinubu’s Victory
LAGOS APRIL 3RD (NEWSRANGERS)-The All Peoples Movement (APM) has said the victory of the All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential candidate, Bola Tinubu, will not stand owing to the “flawed process” of nominating his vice presidential pick, Kashim Shettima.
The party, which filed a petition against the outcome of the 25 February presidential election on 20 March, asked the Presidential Election Petition Court in Abuja to declare Atiku Abubakar, who came second in the poll, as the president-elect.
Mr Tinubu was declared the president-elect on 1 March by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) after he defeated Atiku of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Peter Obi of the Labour Party and 15 others in the 25 February presidential election.
The president-elect scored 8.8 million votes to defeat the other 17 contestants in the race.
Apart from APM, the two leading opposition parties – PDP and the Labour Party – have filed separate petitions at the Presidential Election Petition Court in Abuja to challenge the poll which they alleged was marred by widespread irregularities.
In its petition, the APM whose presidential candidate, Chichi Ojei, polled 25,961 votes, argued that Mr Tinubu was not properly sponsored by the APC by fielding Mr Shettima as vice presidential candidate for the election.
Mr Tinubu while submitting his presidential nomination form to INEC in June 2022, chose Ibrahim Masari, a politician from President Muhammadu Buhari’s home state Katsina, as a “placeholder” for the substantive vice presidential candidate who would later be Mr Shettima.
Political analysts based Mr Tinubu’s initial choice of Mr Masari as a strategy to beat INEC’s deadline of 17 June 2022, for presidential candidates to submit names of their vice presidential picks.
Mr Masari served as a placeholder and later announced his withdrawal from the position, which paved the way for Mr Tinubu to name Mr Shettima as his running mate on 10 July 2022.
Mr Tinubu while on a visit to President Buhari in Daura, Katsina State, announced Mr Shettima as his vice presidential candidate.
But this has formed one of the major grounds for APM’s complaint over the outcome of the presidential election.
The petitioner accused Mr Shettima of “double nominations” having been nominated by the APC as its senatorial candidate for Borno Central District and later vice-presidential flagbearer for the 25 February polls.
Giving details of Mr Shettima’s emergence as APC’s vice presidential pick, APM argued that as of 15 July 2022, Mr Shettima was still a “validly nominated senatorial candidate” of the APC for Borno Central…”
Referencing an acknowledgement slip dated 14 July 2022, from INEC’s online portal, the petitioner said the document showed Mr Shettima replaced Mr Masari as APC’s vice presidential candidate.
“The acts of the 4th respondent (Mr Shettima) double or multiple nomination make his nomination for either of the elective offices/constituencies void particularly the latter.”
Masari’s withdrawal invalidates Tinubu’s candidacy
According to the petitioner, the validity of Mr Tinubu’s nomination as APC’s presidential candidate was “hinged” on his running mate.
APM contended that Mr Tinubu nominated Mr Masari and forwarded the latter’s name to INEC as a vice presidential candidate.
In a copious reference to Sections 131 (C) and 142 of the constitution, the petitioner said Mr Masari “withdrew his purported nomination thereby invalidating the nomination” of Mr Tinubu as APC’s presidential candidate.
Stressing the three-week gap between the period of Mr Masari’s notice of withdrawal and his actual pull-out from the contest, APM argued that by the time Mr Tinubu picked Mr Shettima as his running mate, the president-elect’s “candidature had lapsed” and he was no longer in a position constitutionally to nominate a running mate since he had ceased to be a presidential candidate of the APC.
It further argued that the APC was “bereft of any power…to substitute…” Mr Masari “whose name had already been submitted (as vice presidential candidate) to” the electoral umpire.
Prayers
In the petition filed on 20 March, APM’s lawyer, OM Atoyebi, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), urged the Presidential Election Petition Court to make an order nullifying “all the votes scored” by Mr Tinubu in the presidential election in view of his non-qualification as a candidate of” the APC.
The petitioner said if the court voids Mr Tinubu’s 8.8 votes, it should further set aside his declaration as president-elect by INEC.
According to the APM, if the court accedes to the foregoing requests, it would have effectively excluded Mr Tinubu from the 25 February poll, adding that it should proceed to declare Atiku as the president-elect elect, having polled the second highest votes.
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Posted by News Rangers
on Apr 3 2023. Filed under National.
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