The Presidential Election Petition Court sitting in Abuja and chaired by Justice Haruna Tsammani has struck out the Allied Peoples Movement (APM) petitions against President Bola Tinubu and his Vice Kashim Shettima.
The tribunal also dismissed the APM petition against the Independent National Electoral Commission and four others.
The court ruled against APM’s petitions described as “incompetent” against Tinubu and Shettima because it lacked merit, holding that the issues raised by the APM in its petition contained pre-election matters that could only be determined by the Federal High Court.
Listed as 1st to 5th respondents are INEC, All Progressives Congress, Bola Tinubu, Kashim Shettima and Kabiru Masari.
Speaking on each of the arguments put forward by APM, the court said the petitioners failed to prove their arguments and the petition was void of merits, further upholding the preliminary objections raised by all the respondents to challenge the competence of the petition.
Tsammani held that since the petition centered on the qualification or otherwise of Tinubu to contest the presidential election, the APM ought to have gone to court within 14 days after Tinubu was nominated by the APC, holding that since the cause of action bordered on a pre-election matter, the APM lacked the locus standi to challenge Tinubu’s nomination.
The court also held that the law did not allow a political party to query the process adopted by another political party in nominating its candidate and that invalid nomination or double nomination did not qualify as a ground for disqualification in respect of the presidential election as provided in sections 131 and 137 of the Constitution.
