President Bola Ahmed Tinubu will on Wednesday at the Presidetial Presidential Election Petition Court in Abuja open his defense in a petition by the Labour Party LP and its presidential candidate, Mr Peter Gregory Obi against his declaration as winner of the February 25 presidential election.
Tinubu was on March 1, 2023 declared winner of the disputed election by the Independent N
ational Electoral Commission INEC.
The decision by Tinubu to begin defense followed INEC’S dramatic decision on Tuesday to terminate its own defence in Obi’s petition after calling one witness and tendering four documents.
Although the electoral body had informed the Court of the decision to justify the conduct of the poll with three witnesses, its lead counsel, Mr Abubakar Balarabe Mahmoud suddenly announced the closure of the INEC’S defense at Tuesday’s proceedings.
Tinubu’s lead counsel, Chief Wole Olanipekun SAN told the Court that his client is fully ready to kick-start the defense on July 5 with his witnesses and documents to justify the victory in the presidential election.
At the Tuesday’s proceedings, INEC’S witness, Dr Lawrence Bayode admitted that the electoral body suffered glitches during the presidential election but maintained that the glitches did not in any way affect conduct of the election, collation of results and declaration of final results.
On the allegations of blurred result sheets on INEC’S portal, the Deputy Director of Information and Communication said that clear result sheets can still be obtained on request by those in need of them.
Meanwhile, further hearing in the petition has been shifted to July 5 the Court.