Asiwaju Bola Tinubu, the Presidential Candidate of Nigeria’s ruling All Progressives Congress (APC), has put together a legal team to defend his victory against the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) candidate, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, and Labour Party candidate, Peter Obi, who have both vowed to challenge his win in court. In response, Tinubu also plans to file a cross-petition against Obi, who received over 6.1 million votes, alleging that the LP candidate invented the political rigging machine to get his high number of votes.
Festus Keyamo, SAN, Minister of State for Labour and Employment and chief spokesperson for the Tinubu-Shettima Presidential Campaign Council (PCC), announced this at a news conference in Abuja.
Keyamo also called for sanctions against the Attorneys General of some states that have chosen to challenge Tinubu’s victory at the Supreme Court, arguing that they should have started the process from a lower court.
The APC PCC’s Special Adviser on Media and Communications, Dele Alake, thanked Atiku and Obi for their decision to use the rule of law to challenge the election results, stating that reason had prevailed. He added that Tinubu had urged Nigerians to rally together for the good of the country, regardless of whom they voted for.
The APC PCC plans to examine the process that led to the election results and address the allegations made by the PDP and LP candidates. According to Alake, the use of BVAS brought credibility to the voting process and contributed to the unprecedented outcomes in the 2023 Presidential election.
The APC PCC contends that the loss of Katsina and Lagos to the PDP and LP, respectively, was a surprise outcome that was a result of BVAS ensuring credible voter accreditation. Alake argued that the era of ghost voting and ballot stuffing was over and that over-voting would automatically lead to the cancellation of polling unit results, as demonstrated in the Osun State governorship election. The APC PCC also questioned whether the PDP had attempted to hack the INEC server and whether they had a grand plan to influence the election results.
