Lawyers representing the presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP) in the February 25, 2023 election and first petitioner, Peter Obi, said that a sentence in President Bola Tinubu and Vice President Kashim Shettima’s address was nothing short of alarming to them and millions of Nigerians.
The legal team of Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, in his final written address filed on July 20, also asked the court to uphold the declaration made by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) that he (Atiku) won 21 states in the February 25 presidential election.
*President’s lawyers say Atiku, Obi ‘labouring in vain’
But President Bola Tinubu’s counsels urged the court to dismiss the claims of both the LP and PDP, saying the two candidates were only ‘labouring in vain’.
They said, in their response to Obi’s final written address, that rather than prove the claims in his petition that he won the February 25 election, “The petitioners have been so busy and occupied milling around the worn out and obsolete subject of the contrived disqualification of the respondents.”
They also dismissed as untenable Obi’s call for a rerun between him and the PDP presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar.
Obi and his party, the respondents argued, “have no locus standi to present a petition challenging the 2nd respondent (Tinubu) on the purported ground that he did not score 25 per cent of votes cast in the FCT, having been constitutionally barred and/or excluded from participating in any rerun election, in the unlikely event of the court making such an order, as Section 134(3(a) and (b) of the Constitution prohibits and excludes him from so doing.”
Olanipekun said that in the unlikely event of a rerun, Obi and the LP should be excluded on the strength of the provision of Section 134 (3) (a) and (b) of the Constitution.
That part of the Constitution reads: “In default of a candidate duly elected under subsection (2) of this Section there shall be a second election under subsection (4) of this section at which the only candidate shall be *(a) the candidate who scored the highest number of votes at any election held by the said subsection (2) of this Section; and, (b) one among the remaining candidates who have a majority of votes in the highest number of states, so, however, where there is more than one candidate with the majority of votes in the highest number of states, the candidate among them with the highest total of votes cast at the election shall be the second candidate for the election.”
Obi and the LP had, in their petition, asked the court to order a rerun because Tinubu did not score 25 per cent of votes in the Federal Capital Territory (FCT).
Tinubu and Shettima, however, said in their reply to the final written address by Obi and the LP that the petitioners lack locus standi to present a petition challenging the 2nd respondent (Tinubu) on the purported ground that he did not score 25 per cent of votes cast in the FCT.
They said that even if a rerun was ordered, Obi can only vote and cannot be voted for, as the duel or contest will now be between the 2nd respondent and the person who scored “the next majority of votes in the highest number of states (19 states)” and who “also came second by plurality of votes,” that is Atiku.
•Tinubu, Shettima response shocking, says Obi
Obi and the LP, through their lawyers led by Livy Uzoukwu and Onyechi Ikpeazu, in their final written address, while responding to Tinubu, held that the 2nd Respondent (Tinubu) and the 3rd respondent (Shettima) went too low and abandoned discretion in their presentation.
Recall that Tinubu’s legal team led by Wole Olanipekun (SAN) had in their final address to the court warned that if the court interprets the Electoral Act section 134 against them, it might lead to a breakdown of law and order.
They had stated that “Any other interpretation different from theirs will lead to absurdity, chaos, anarchy and alteration of the very intention of the legislature.”
Obi, questioned when it has become offensive for petitioners to challenge an election as enshrined in Section 134(1) (b) of the Electoral Act 2022.
He noted that the 2nd and 3rd respondents’ response was simply “desperation taken too far, which can be extremely dangerous.”
The former governor of Anambra State explained that rather, anarchy reigns supreme where the rule of law is trampled upon or truncated.
According to Obi, “A sentence in the 2nd-3rd Respondents’ address alarmed the petitioners and millions of Nigerians. The 2nd-3rd Respondents went too low and abandoned discretion when they claimed as follows, “Our submission is that the petitioners are inviting anarchy by their ventilation of this issue of non-transmission of results electronically, by INEC.”
The Obi legal team noted that they found Tinubu’s outburst as “a cheap, misguided, and destructive blackmail intended to target the country’s judicial-ism and constitutionalism. It also aims at cannibalising our democracy.”
The legal team also noted that the careless and absurd statements of the 2nd and 3rd Respondents intended to raise the issue of insecurity if the petitioners were to emulate the bad example of the 2nd-3rd Respondents, but remarked that such will never happen because of the petitioner’s discipline and peaceful disposition and belief in the rule of law.
•‘Tribunal should ensure justice is delivered’
Meanwhile, the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Atiku Abubakar, has said the heavens will not fall if President Tinubu was removed by the court.
He, therefore, pleaded with the PEPC to summon the courage to do substantial justice to his petition seeking the nullification of Tinubu as the winner of the February 25 election.
Atiku pointedly said that contrary to the threat of Tinubu, the heavens would not fall when he (Tinubu) is sacked by the tribunal as Nigeria’s President on the account of what he claimed was massive electoral fraud that brought him to office.
In his final written address, Atiku dismissed Tinubu’s threat as an empty one deployed to scare the Tribunal from upholding justice in the petition challenging Tinubu’s election.
His lead counsel, Chief Chris Uche (SAN) in his final written address settled by his former Vice President recalled the courageous position of the Supreme Court in the case of Rotimi Amaechi, where the Apex Court held that heavens would not fall when justice is done in the manner prescribed by law.
Justice George Adesola Oguntade, who delivered the Supreme Court judgment in the cited authority, had said, “I must do justice even if the heavens fall. The truth, of course, is that when Justice has been done, the heavens stay in one place and peace.”
Atiku asked the Tribunal to invoke the courage displayed in the past Supreme Court judgment to settle his petition against Tinubu by disregarding the threat of monumental chaos issued by Tinubu to shield himself from justice.
The former Vice President maintained that Tinubu had lost the moral and legal rights to be in office as President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, having admitted a punitive forfeiture of $460,000 in a narcotics and money laundering-related matter.
Besides, Atiku accused the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) of manipulating the results of the presidential election in the most corrupt manner in favour of Tinubu and thereafter, unlawfully proclaimed him (Tinubu) winner of the election, a development that provided more grounds for the nullification.
Citing the brazen subversion of the popular will of the voters by INEC in favour of Tinubu, the former Vice President appealed that the proclamation of the electoral body is voided and set aside and in its place, declare him the winner of the election having convincingly scored the majority of the lawful votes.
