JUST IN: Presidential Election Petition Court dismisses first petition filed against Tinubu’s victory

On Monday, the Presidential Election Petition Court in Abuja dismissed one of five petitions challenging Bola Tinubu’s victory in the February 25 election.

After the petitioner’s counsel declared its withdrawal, a five-member panel of the court led by Haruna Tsammani rejected the case.

It was the first of the five petitions received by the court to be heard.

Earlier, the court convened its inaugural session, during which it guaranteed all litigants that it would do justice to all parties in the matter before it.

Lawyers responded by promising to cooperate with the court.

The panel members went on a short break after the ceremonial opening of the court and retuned to begin hearing AA’s case.

A confusion about the legal representative of the party ensued when the party’s case was called.

Oba Maduabuchi, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, first announced appearance for the AA party. Another lawyer, Malachi Umuebe, also announced appearance for the party.

Mr Maduabuchi insisted that he was the party’s lawyer.

The court discountenanced Mr Umuebe since he was not the one who filed the petition before the court.

Shortly after the court recognised Mr Maduabuchi, the lawyer announced the withdrawal of the case.

The respondents’ lawyers – Wole Olanipekun, SAN, representing Mr Tinubu, and Abubakar Mahmoud, SAN, representing the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), said they had no objection against the application for the withdrawal of the petition.

The court then dismissed the petition.

But the Action Alliance has urged the court to nullify the polls owing to alleged refusal of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to upload the name of its actual presidential candidate – Solomon-David Okanigbuan – to its portal for the February poll.

The National Chairman of Action Alliance, Adekunle Omo-Aje, had said in January that Hamza Al-Mustapha, recognised by INEC was not the authentic presidential candidate of the party.

He spoke against the background of the leadership tussle rocking his party, which gave rise to the emergence of two presidential candidates.