Former Lagos State governor and All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential candidate, Bola Ahmed Tinubu together with his party, have filed a lawsuit to restrain the two main opposition parties, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Labour Party (LP) from following through on their threat to ensure that the continuous announcement and collation of results grind to a halt.
As reported by Daily Trust, the suit, marked FHC/KN/CS/43/2023, was instituted before the Federal High Court in Kano on Tuesday, February 28, 2023.
Joined also as defendants in the suite were the Action Alliance and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), while Tinubu’s running mate, Kashim Shettima was also listed as a plaintiff.
According to the platform, the plaintiffs in a motion on notice filed alongside the originating summons asked the court to make the order restraining the defendants from stopping the collation and announcement of the results.
They also argued that, “damages will not adequately compensate for the injury that may be occasioned on the Plaintiffs if by the Defendants stop the collation of the result.”
You’d recall that a coalition of opposition parties comprising the PDP, LP, and the ADC had called for an outright cancellation of the Saturday, February 25, 2023, general elections citing widespread violence, alleged rigging, manipulation of results, intimidation of voters, and violation of the laid down rules by INEC as their reasons.
They also demanded for the resignation of the commission’s chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, over his refusal to address the concerns raised by agents of the two political parties during collation of results.
The coalition therefore alleged that Yakubu has compromised and no longer fit to continue as the chief electoral umpire in Nigeria.