By Nathaniel Zacchaeus, Abuja
President of the Senate, Godswill Akpabio, his deputy Barau Jibrin, Leader of the Senate, Opeyemi Bamidele, and former Senate president, Ahmad Lawan, have congratulated President Bola Tinubu, on his victory at the Supreme Court.
They warned opposition parties and their candidates against stampeding the judiciary into partisan politics through disinformation, mal-information, and misinformation
Akpabio in a congratulatory message to Tinubu said the decision of the apex court was a welcome relief as it finally unfastens the last bolts to the path for social-political engineering that President Tinubu promised the nation.
He said, “Mr President, I am personally elated that the jurists of the Supreme Court saw through the arguments and even without many technicalities easily confirmed your victory in the poll.
“There is no doubt that victory came at a cost, but Mr President, that makes it even sweeter. I know you have in your years of public service yielded your personal and other comforts for the collective good and what it cost to confirm the victory in the courts should be seen with a similar vista.
READ ALSO:Final verdict: No case!
Akpabio also urged the president not to relent in being a father figure to his former rivals saying that it was superfluous to remind the president of his well-known big heart.
The Senate President also called on the major rivals of the President to sheath their swords of political combat and join hands with the Tinubu administration in the collective goal of making the nation great again.
“The elections have been announced by the electoral authorities and confirmed by the courts, and I call on all former political rivals of the president to show good faith by joining hands with the Bola Tinubu administration in its ongoing efforts to take the nation to a higher level.”
Jibrin described the judgement as a victory for democracy and urged the appellants to join hands with President Tinubu to address the challenges facing the country.
He urged the appellants to accept the ruling by the apex court in good faith, he commended the justices of the court for upholding the verdict of the electorate who voted for President Tinubu during the presidential election.
He said, “The legal battle is over with today’s judgement of the Supreme Court, affirming the victory of President Bola Ahmed Tinubu at the February 25, 2023, presidential election. Nigerians have won, democracy has won, and the country will be better for it.
“I commend the justices of the Supreme Court for upholding the verdict of the Nigerian electorate who voted for President Tinubu during the presidential election.
“It is now time for all to team up with the president to actualise his lofty programmes and policies for the development of our country as captured in the Renewed Hope Agenda,’’ he said.
Bamidele, who chaired the Senate Committee on Judiciary, Human Rights, and Legal Matters in the Ninth National Assembly, kicked against how they unduly dragged the judiciary into partisan politics in pursuit of their selfish interests at the expense of the collective interest of Nigeria and Nigerians.
He expressed these grave concerns in a statement his Directorate of Media and Public Affairs issued on Thursday in Abuja following the decision of the apex court that affirmed the election of President Tinubu.
While celebrating the victory of the president at the apex court, Bamidele condemned the undue blackmailing of the judiciary even before the petitions of the opposition parties and their candidates were decided.
He observed that the judiciary “is one of the most consistent, dependable democratic institutions that still stand for and with the oppressed in this federation. It is therefore amoral and immoral for any political actor or party to subject the judiciary to media trial rather than abiding by the rules of law.
“Judiciary has never been vilified in the recent history of this federation by petitioners who at different times benefitted tremendously from the independence and neutrality of the judiciary,” the senate leader noted with grave concern.
At the inception, Bamidele noted that the petitioners “claimed to have won the 2023 presidential elections during their separate world press conferences. But when they failed to prove their cases, they selfishly resorted to blackmailing the time-tested institutions, especially the judiciary
Beyond their campaign of calumny, he observed that the decisions of the appellate and apex courts “have clearly shown that the last elections are the most credible since the beginning of the Fourth Republic with the deployment of Bimodal Voter Accreditation System, which the Independent National Electoral Commission used for the conduct of the elections.
He, therefore, commended the apex court for standing for the truth and truth alone amid ferocious, needless, and relentless intimidation of judicial officers by the petitioners, who trampled upon the national interest in the pursuit of their self-centric political agenda.
Lawan said since the Judiciary has concluded all the presidential election petitions in favour of President Tinubu, all political actors, interests, and parties “to henceforth stop playing politics with the rule of law and the integrity of the judiciary.”
He said, “As far as Nigeria is concerned, the judiciary remains an unbiased arbiter wholly committed to the dispensation of justice without regard to any ethnic, economic, political, or religious consideration.
“It is therefore unfair and uncalled to paint the judiciary, the only source of hope for the oppressed, black in the eyes of the whole world. This does not harm the judiciary alone but also portrays all of us, Nigerians at home and in the diaspora, as bad before the eyes of the whole world. This is completely unacceptable! And it must be stopped!”
