The Presidential election petitions tribunal sitting in Abuja were judgement is being delivered in the petition filed by the presidential candidate of the peoples democratic party, Atiku Abubakir challenging the victory of president Muhammadu Buhari as the winner of the February 23rd 2019 presidential election is currently under way.
It would be recalled that President Buhari was declared the winner of the election after scoring 15,191,847 votes as against Atiku’s 11, 262,978 votes.
The court commenced ruling in an application raised by the INEC Praying for an order of the court striking out the petition, as the petitioner having failed to join the vice president( yemi Osinbajo)who is a necessary party in the petition rendered the petition incompetent
The court in a unanimous decision refused the application filed by INEC seeking an order of the court to strike out the petition filed by Atiku Abubakar having failed to join the vice president in the petition.
They held that the application lacked merit
The court is ruling on the second application filed by INEC, seeking an order striking out the list of documents presented by the petitioner, his witnesses and the number of under listed paragraph in his petition for being imprecise and fails to identity the various polling unit the infractions took place.
Levi Uzuokwu, lead counsel to Mr Atiku is not a lawyer known to the Nigeria Bar Association and his name is not in the enrollment order of legal practitioner at the supreme court
The court held that the petitioners list of documents and witnesses were competently and validity signed by a legal practitioner and has found the lead counsel to Mr Atiku Competent