Presidential Poll: Atiku files petition, insists Tinubu not qualified to contest

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Presidential Poll: Atiku files petition, insists Tinubu not qualified to contest

Candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, Atiku Abubakar has filed a petition to challenge the declaration of Bola Tinubu of the ruling All Progressives Congress, APC, as the winner of the presidential election that was held on February 25.

Atiku, in the petition, marked: CA/PEPC/05/2023, which he lodged before the Presidential Election Petition Court, PEPC, sitting at the Abuja Division of the Court of Appeal, applied for the withdrawal of the Certificate of Return that was issued to Tinubu by the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC.

He maintained that the declaration of Tinubu as the winner of the presidential election was “invalid by reason of non-compliance with the provisions of the Electoral Act, 2022”.

Atiku, through his team of lawyers led by Mr Joe Kyari Gadzama, SAN, further argued that Tinubu’s election was invalid by reason of corrupt practices.

“The 2nd Respondent was not duly elected by a majority of lawful votes cast at the Election.

“The 2nd Respondent was at the time of the Election not qualified to contest the Election”, Atiku added while listing grounds he said the court should consider nullifying Tinubu’s election.

He prayed the court to declare him the winner of the presidential election, having secured the second-highest number of lawful votes cast at the election.

Meanwhile, Vanguard learned that Atiku’s legal team perfected the petition filing process at the Registry of the Court, late in the night on Tuesday.

It will be recalled that the Labour Party, LP, and its candidate, Mr. Peter Obi, had Monday night, also filed a petition before the court to void the declaration of Tinubu as the President-elect.

They prayed the court to hold that Tinubu was not legally qualified to contest the election, alleging that he was previously convicted and fined the sum of $460,000.00 by the United States District Court, Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division, in Case No: 93C 4483, for an offence involving dishonesty and drug trafficking.

Obi prayed the court to declare him as the candidate that secured the majority of the lawful votes cast with the required constitutional spread of not less than 25% of the votes cast in at least 2/3 of the States of the Federation, and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja.

In the alternative, he prayed the court to order a fresh poll, with the exclusion of both Tinubu and the APC, by virtue of their non qualification to participate in the election.

It will be recalled that INEC had on March 1, announced Tinubu as the winner of the presidential poll, ahead of 17 other candidates that contested the election.

It declared that Tinubu scored a total of 8,794,726 votes to defeat Atiku who polled a total of 6,984,520 votes and Obi who came third with a total of 6,101,533 votes.

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