By Deborah Onyofufeke, Abuja
The Presidential Election Petition Court (PEPC) yesterday in Abuja turned down the request of the People’s Democratic Party, PDP, and its presidential candidate, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, for the live stream of proceedings of his petition challenging the result of the February 25 election and the declaration of Bola Ahmed Tinubu as the winner at the polls.
Chairman of the Court, Justice Haruna Simon Tsammani who delivered the unanimous decision of the panel said that the request was not rooted in the petition Atiku filed before the Court.
He added that the request was novel and not supported by any law in the country for now.
Justice Tsammani also said that the request was capable of turning the Court into Stadium or market square and that such must not be allowed for now.
The court held that granting a live telecast of the proceedings of the petition would not add any totalitarian value to the petition.
Justice Tsammani finally held that the petition was without merit and subsequently dismissed it.
The presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Atiku Abubakar, had filed an application on May 8 for an order to allow the live coverage of the daily court proceedings on the case they brought against the President-elect, Bola Tinubu, following the February 25 election.
Atiku and the PDP in the application specifically prayed to the tribunal for “An order directing the Court’s Registry and the parties on modalities for admission of Media Practitioners and their Equipment into the courtroom.”
They argued in their petition that since the whole of Nigeria cannot be present in the courtroom, watching the live broadcast will give Nigerians closure as the hearing is of utmost importance to the people.
The Labour Party (LP) and its presidential candidate, Peter Obi, followed suit with a similar application asking that proceedings of the tribunal be televised.
However, counsels for the President-elect, Bola Tinubu, and the All Progressives Congress (APC), opposed the move to consolidate the three different petitions.
They insisted that merging all the petitions would affect their ability to effectively defend all the issues that were raised by the petitioners.
They maintained that the petitioners did not only raise various issues but are seeking different reliefs.
