May 08, (THEWILL) – The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its candidate, Atiku Abubakar, have filed an application for an order to allow live coverage of day-to-day proceedings of the Presidential Election Petition Court (PEPC).
Atiku and Peter Obi, presidential candidate of the Labour Party (LP), are currently challenging the declaration of Bola Ahmed Tinubu of the All Progressive Congress (APC), as winner of the February 25 presidential poll.
THEWILL reports that a three-man panel of the PEPC, is due to commence a pre-hearing session on all petitions that were brought before it at the Court of Appeal in Abuja.
In the motion filed through his team of lawyers, led by Chris Uche (SAN), Atiku specifically applied for; “An order, directing the Court’s Registry and the parties on modalities for admission of Media Practitioners and their Equipment into the courtroom.”
The PDP candidate and former Vice President contended that the petition he lodged against the President-elect, was “a matter of national concern and public interest.”
He argued that the case involved citizens and electorate in the 36 States of the Federation and the Federal Capital Territory, Abuja, who he said voted and participated in the presidential poll.
More so, he drew the attention of the court to the fact that the International Community is equally interested in issues about Nigeria’s electoral process.
In the motion dated May 5, Atiku and the PDP insisted that their case against Tinubu, being a unique electoral dispute with a peculiar constitutional dimension, they said it was a matter of public interest in which millions of Nigerian citizens and voters are stakeholders, with the constitutional right to be part of the proceedings.
“An integral part of the constitutional duty of the Court to hold proceedings in public is a discretion to allow public access to proceedings either physically or by electronic means.
“With the huge and tremendous technological advances and developments in Nigeria and beyond, including the current trend by this Honourable Court towards embracing electronic procedures, virtual hearing, and electronic filing, a departure from the Rules to allow a regulated televising of the proceedings in this matter aligns with the maxim that justice must not only be done, but must be seen to be done.
“Televising court proceedings is not alien to this Honourable Court, and will enhance public confidence”, the petitioners added.
Atiku had in his joint petition with the PDP, marked: CA/PEPC/05/2023, applied for the withdrawal of the Certificate of Return that was issued to Tinubu by INEC.
He maintained that the declaration of Tinubu as the winner of the presidential election was “invalid because of non-compliance with the provisions of the Electoral Act, 2022”.
Atiku further argued that Tinubu’s election was invalid because 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.
