Obi lays out legal strategies to reclaim his ‘stolen’ mandate
By Jeph Ajobaju, Chief Copy Editor
Peter Obi begins today at the tribunal, his head to head tackle with Bola Tinubu over the authentic result of the presidential election on February 25 although the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) declared Tinubu winner.
The INEC on March 1 declared Tinubu President-elect on the platform of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
INEC Chairman Mahmood Yakubu announced Tinubu won 8.8 million votes, followed by Atiku Abubakar (6.9 million), Obi (6.1 million), and others.
Atiku of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP and Obi of the Labour Party (LP) filed separate petitions at the Presidential Election Petitions Tribunal (PEPT) seeking orders to annul the election or to declare them the winner, among other reliefs.
Below are five of the prayers tabled by Obi to reclaim what he claims to be his “stolen” mandate from Tinubu, as condensed from his petition by Tribune.
Tinubu did not score 25% of FCT votes
Obi and the LP want the tribunal to determine “that the 2nd Respondent [Tinubu] having failed to score one-quarter of the votes cast at the Presidential Election in the Federal Capital Territory [FCT], Abuja was not entitled to be declared and returned as the winner of the presidential election held on 25 February 2023.”
Annulment of election
Obi and his party are seeking the cancellation of the election, arguing “the Presidential election conducted on 25th February, 2023 is void on the ground that the election was not conducted substantially in accordance with the provisions of the Electoral Act 2022 and Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999, as amended.”
Fresh election
The petitioners want the court to compel the INEC to conduct a fresh election.
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Tinubu/Shettima to be disqualified from election rerun
Both Obi and the LP want the tribunal to disqualify Tinubu and his running mate, Kashim Shettima, from the fresh or rerun presidential ballot.
“The nomination of Kashim Shettima as vice presidential candidate was defective as he did not withdraw from his nomination as a senatorial candidate of his party before accepting to serve as vice presidential candidate of Mr Tinubu,” they argued.
Tinubu not eligibility to content ab initio
The petitioners argued that Tinubu should not have been eligible to run for the top office due to his “ineligibility”.
Obi submitted through his lead lawyer, Livy Uzoukwu, that Tinubu “was not duly elected by majority of the lawful votes cast at the time of the election.”
And that Tinubu “was linked to drug trafficking by a US court” leading to his forfeiture of $460,000 to the American government, and is, therefore, “not qualified to contest Nigerian presidency.”