President Bola Tinubu and Vice President Kashim Shettima have tendered evidence before the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal to prove that Peter Obi is not a qualified member of the Labour Party.
The counsel to Tinubu and Shettima on Wednesday submitted to the tribunal a copy of the LP membership register for Anambra State, which they said will prove that Obi is not a registered member of the party
The Nation reports that Tinubu and Shettima had contended in their reply to Obi and the LP’s petitions that because Obi was not a member of the party at the time of the previous presidential election, he was not qualified to run on the LP’s platform.
Chief Wole Olanipekun (SAN), their counsel, presented the document, as well as LP’s letter dated April 25, 2022, delivering the membership record to the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC).
The documents were presented alongside other materials at the start of Tinubu and Shettima’s defence in the petition filed by Obi and the LP before the tribunal.
The documents were admitted as evidence despite an objection raised by the counsel for the petitioners, Livy Uzoukwu (SAN).
They were subsequently marked as Exhibits RA17 and RA18.
In June, Obi closed his case in his petition challenging the election of President Bola Tinubu.
Obi and LP are complainants in the petition marked CA/PEPC/03/2023, challenging the outcome of the 2023 presidential election which brought Tinubu to power as Nigeria’s president.
Respondents in the petition are the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Tinubu, Shettima and the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
The petitioners were given three weeks to prove their case against the respondents before the court.
Even though the petitioners informed the court that they would call 50 witnesses to prove their case, they were only able to call 13 witnesses during the closing of their case.
