Posted by For the third time, the Presidential Electoral Petitions Court (PEPC) has been forced to stop hearing the petition of Peter Gregory Obis and the Labor Party against the election of President Boral Ahmed Tinnub.
The court rejected the request due to the incorrect arrangement of the documents that were requested to establish allegations of fraud in the February 25 presidential election. The court found in Thursday’s trial that the documents were not properly organized as ordered by the court.
In the drama that unfolded during the submission of documents for the 23 local government areas of Benue, many discrepancies were found. All efforts to mediate the exceptions and rearrange the files were unsuccessful as the errors could not be fixed immediately.
To save the day, Obi and Labor Chief Counsel Emeka Okpoko SAN tried to use the unsubmitted documents to initiate legal proceedings but the move was dismissed as illegal. Finally, the court stayed the petition and ordered the legal team to resubmit the list of documents as per the preliminary investigation report.
Three tumultuous waves of Obie petition hearings prompted a change in petition hearings. At the time of writing, Peter Obi and Vice Presidential candidate Dati Baba Ahmed are in court as their lawyers seek to file a new list of documents at the court registry.
Meanwhile, the five judges led by Justice Haruna Simon Chamani who heard the petition have retired to their chambers awaiting the legal team to bring order inside.