Tribunal Upholds President Tinubu’s Election

With All Eyes on the Judiciary,” the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal on Wednesday delivered judgment in the several petitions filed by aggrieved parties against the outcome of the February 25, 2023 presidential election in which President Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress (APC) was declared winner.
In a 12-hour marathon judgment, which started from 9.30 am and lasted far into the night, the tribunal led by Hon. Justice Haruna Tsammani, affirmed the election of Senator Bola Tinubu and Senator Kashim Shettima as President and Vice-President in the February 25, 2023 election. “I affirm the return of Bola Ahmed Tinubu as the duly elected President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria,” Justice Tsammani said in giving the final verdict of the tribunal.
The tribunal first dismissed the petition filed by Allied Peoples Movement, APM challenging the joint APC ticket on the grounds of double nomination on the grounds that Senator Shettima, had first been nominated as the senatorial candidate of the APC in Borno State before being nominated as the vice-presidential candidate of the APC.
The tribunal held that the petition was not only statute barred as it should have been filed within 14 days of the nomination at the Federal High Court, but also that the law did not permit members of a political party to challenge the nomination of candidates in another political party.
After dismissing the APM petition, the tribunal took up the petition filed by the Labour Party and Mr. Peter Obi, its presidential candidate. It dismissed the petition as well, before turning to the petition filed by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its Presidential candidate, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar.
Addressing some of the particulars of the petition by Labour Party, the tribunal said Labour Party and Obi failed to prove that they won the February 25 election with evidence of a result that clearly showed that they won.
It also held that the claims by the party and its candidate that there were massive irregularities and violence which impacted the result were not proved with evidence. The claims were generic and not pinned down to specific polling units where they occurred to prove their claim, the tribunal said.
“LP alleged that INEC reduced their scores and added it to APC votes but, failed to supply particulars of what they actually scored before the said reductions, neither did they supply the polling units where it happened,” the tribunal said.
But then, the tribunal dismissed a petition by the APC against the membership of Mr. Obi of the Labour Party as incompetent, stating that the membership of a political party is an internal affair of the party not open to outsiders.
The tribunal rejected the report of forensic analyses tendered by LP because it was made during the pendency of the trial. It also rejected the European Union Report, which indicted the election on the grounds that it was not tendered by an official of the EU.
The tribunal stated emphatically that a candidate did not require to win 25 percent of votes cast in the FCT to b declared winner because residents of the FCT had no special privileges.
The tribunal said there was no record of any criminal arrest and conviction of the APC presidential candidate and therefore, he was qualified to contest the election.
On the issue of the failure of INEC to use the BVAS to transmit result and upload the results from the polling units to the IREV, the tribunal held that there was no law that compelled INEC to transmit election results from polling units electronically. It said the BVAS machine was mainly for accreditation purposes and INEC had the option to transmit result manually.
Similarly, in analyzing the petition filed by the PDP and Atiku, the tribunal said the claims of irregularities were generic and not specific, saying the petitioners did not list the polling stations where the malpractices took place.
It dismissed the statements made by 15 witnesses, which it said were not filed with the petition. It also struck out the PDP’s dual citizenship petition against Tinubu
Meanwhile, reactions have been pouring in about the judgments.
Labour has already rejected the verdict of the tribunal, claiming that justice was not served on the petition. In a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Obiora Ifoh, the party said “the judgment did not respect the law and the desire of the people.”
It said, “Nigerians were witnesses to the electoral robbery that took place on February 25, 2023, which was globally condemned but the tribunal in its wisdom refused to accept the obvious. What is at stake is democracy and we will not relent until the people’s will prevails.”
Tinubu’s camp welcomed the judgment and called on Obi and Atiku to join hands with the government. Ajuri Ngelale, the Presidential Spokesman said having exercised their rights under the law, “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 Nigerians.”
Former National Chairman of All progressives Grand Alliance, Chief Chekwas Okorie, said he was not surprised about the verdicts of the tribunal dismissing the petitions against the election of President Tinubu. He said Atiku and Obi relied on technical points rather than prove how they won the election. “Rather than prove a case of substantial non-compliance with the electoral law, they seemed to have relied on scoring technical points to win their petitions,” Okorie said.
Chief Goddy Uwazurike, the President of Aka Ikenga, described the judgment as naked justice. “The judgment today showed that justice is lying prostrate while technicality stood over it. To be blunt, the judiciary failed realize that it was on trial in the court of the people,” Uwazurike said.
The long judgment took a toll on litigants and legal representatives, who slept off as the judgment rolled on. Tinubu, Obi and Atiku were not in court.
Days before the verdict, former Supreme Court Justice, Mrs. Mary Odili, had courted controversy when she called on those likely to lose the case at the tribunal to accept the verdict in good faith. She said it was normal for people who lose in court to feel cheated.
More Reactions to the PEPT Verdict
Shallow, Unreasonable, absurd – Dagogo Iboroma (SAN)
A Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Mr. Dagogo Iboroma, picked holes in the judgment of the presidential election Petition Tribunal. He said some of the reasons given by the tribunal for its decisions were “shallow, unreasonable and absurd.”
On the issue of the nomination of Kashim Shettima as the vice-presidential running-mate of the All Progressives Congress, Iboroma said the tribunal got it wrong when it limited it to a pre-election matter.
“The issue of the nomination of Shettima being a pre-election matter only is also totally wrong. It is both a pre-election and post-election matter. It is a pre-election litigation for aggrieved APC members who contested with Shettima and Tinubu. That decision that led to the striking out of APM petition is so shallow, unreasonable and absurd,” he said.
The senior lawyer said the tribunal might have set the Nigeria’s elections back by another ten years with its verdict. He said contrary to what the tribunal said about INC having the discretion to use BIVAS to transmit results or upload results to the IReV, INEC had no choice but to use the devises because it was bound by law to do so.
He said, “The Electoral Act gave INEC discretion on how to transmit results. INEC was not satisfied with that discretion. INEC later introduced Regulation on electronic transmission. The regulation is subsidiary legislation and INEC is bound by its own subsidiary legislation.
“When a principal legislation gives a statutory body a choice of action (discretion) and the statutory body under its own power makes regulation taking away that choice (discretion), it is bound by the regulation. It no longer has a choice in the matter.”
Winning Abuja Is Strong Requirement – Tony Okafor, lawyer
Mr. Tony Okafor, an Awka-based lawyer also faulted the tribunal on its verdict that a presidential candidate did not require to win 25 percent of the votes in the Federal Capital Territory win an election. “It’s a strong and distinctive requirement,” Okafor said.
“The intendment of the drafters of the law is not to make Abuja voters superior to other voters in other parts of the country as erroneously interpreted by the learned judges. It is rather to demonstrate Abuja as a special centre where the president of Nigeria resides and rules especially through a minister,” he added.