COURTROOM NEWS 14/12/2022
2023: Court Rejects Suit Seeking to Bar Tinubu
Federal High Court in Abuja has dismissed a suit seeking to bar the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) Asiwaju Bola Tinubu from participating in next year’s election.
Justice Obiora Egwuatu, in a judgement on Tuesday, held that the suit filed by a political party, Action Alliance (AA), was statute barred, having been filed outside the 14 days allowed under the Constitution.
Justice Egwuatu, who upheld the preliminary objection raised by the APC and Tinubu, noted said that the suit was grossly incompetent, thereby robbing the court of the jurisdiction to entertain it or grant the reliefs sought by the plaintiff.
The judge equally held that the plaintiff lacked the locus standi to file the suit, adding that the AA acted as a busy body by seeking to interfere in the internal affairs of another political party.
The suit marked: FHC/ABJ/CS/954/2022, had the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), the APC and Tinubu listed as defendants.
The plaintiff had among others prayed the court to declare that Tinubu’s that he attended Government College, Ibadan and the University of Chicago, as contained on his INEC FORM CF 001 in 1999 which he presented to INEC, was false.
It equally sought a declaration that the false information on Tinubu’s “INEC FORM CF 001 wherein he claims to have been awarded a Bachelor of Science Degree in Economics by the University of Chicago is a forged certificate.”
The plaintiff urged the court to declare that in view of Section 137(1)(j) of the 1999 Constitution, Tinubu, having allegedly presented a forged certificate to INEC in INEC FORM CF 001 which he submitted as a candidate in the 1999 general elections for the post of the Governor of Lagos State, was not qualified to contest for the office of president of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
While urging the court to declare that the submission Tinubu’s name to the electoral umpire by the APC (2nd defendant) as its 2023 presidential candidate is null and void and of no effects, AA prayed the court to issue an order of perpetual injunction restraining INEC from publishing his (Tinubu’s) name as a candidate in next presidential election.
AA equally sought an order of perpetual injunction restraining INEC from listing APC as a political party in the ballot for the conduct of the 2023 presidential election to be conducted by INEC.
