Anxiety as Tribunal hears Obi, Atiku’s petitions against Tinubu today

……Onanuga asks opposition parties to stop blackmailing judiciary

There are palpable anxiety as the Presidential Election Tribunal begins hearing of the petitions filed before it by aggrieved opposition parties against the election of the President-elect, Bola Tinubu today, Monday May 8.

Some opposition parties including the Peoples Democratic Party and the Labour Party and their candidates had approached the tribunal following the declaration of Tinubu as the winner of the Presidential election by the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC on 1st March 2023.

Atiku Abubakar of the PDP, his Labour Party counterpart, Peter Obi and others had approached the tribunal to upturn Tinubu’s victory on the grounds of substantial non-compliance with the provisions of the Constitution, the Electoral Act and the guidelines of INEC, for the conduct of the poll.

Atiku, a former vice president, who hinged his petition on five grounds, is asking the court to order the electoral body to conduct a fresh election following alleged irregularities at polling units during the presidential poll.

Atiku and his party are saying that Tinubu was declared the winner of the election when all results and accreditation data from polling units were yet to be transmitted and uploaded by INEC.

Obi, a former Anambra governor is also alleging various irregularities in the conduct of the election, insisting that Tinubu and his running mate, Senator Kashim Shettima, were not qualified to contest.

Obi also said that Tinubu failed to win the majority of lawful votes and was unable to garner one-quarter of votes in the Federal Capital Territory, FCT.

Monday’s hearing is the pre-hearing session where the Court is expected to provide a full timetable for hearing the substantive petitions filed against the President-elect at the election tribunal.

Meanwhile, a spokesperson for the President-elect, Bola Tinubu, Mr Bayo Onanuga, has warned the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, and the Labour Party, LP, to stop blackmailing the judiciary.

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Onanuga alleged that both parties and their surrogates, whom he described as lawyers, clerics and some ethnic groups, had “mounted a desperate campaign for the postponement of the inauguration of the President-elect on May 29.

He insisted that the 2023 election was the best and the most free, fair and transparent since the second republic.