Check out the first photos from the Presidential Election Petitions Court in Abuja

Photos from outside the Presidential Election Petitions Court (PEPC) have emerged.

The PEPC scheduled for May 8, 2023 (today), is hearing petitions challenging the declaration of All Progressives Congress (APC) standard bearer, Senator Bola Tinubu, as the president-elect.

The legal battle is expected to begin at 9 am.

The National Legal Adviser of the APC, Ahmad El-Marzuq, who confirmed the date, said the APC legal team had been briefed and was ready to defend the party’s mandate.

“We have been briefed about the hearing coming up next week,” he said.
A member of Tinubu’s legal team, Tayo Oyetibo (SAN), also said the hearing had been scheduled to commence next week.

Oyetibo said: “Yes, the hearing is on Monday, but it’s for a pre-hearing session. The hearing is to clarify if there are any applications before the main hearing will start. The timetable will be set for the hearing of the substantive matters.”

Findings also showed that the court stopped receiving replies from the petitioners on April 2

The Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof Mahmood Yakubu, had on March 1 declared Tinubu the president-elect on the grounds that his party scored the majority of votes cast in the polls.

The former Lagos State governor had polled 8.8 million to defeat the Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) who scored 6.9 million; Peter Obi of the Labour Party (LP) who polled 6.1 million votes and 15 other candidates.

Dissatisfied with the result, Atiku and Obi have both disputed the results and filed separate petitions seeking orders to annul the election or declare them the winners of the polls.

Atiku urged the court to cancel the election and order a fresh election due to alleged irregularities that marred the February 25 polls in thousands of polling units.
In their 66-page petition, Atiku and his party, through his team of senior lawyers led by Joe-Kyari Gadzama (SAN), argued that as of March 1 when Tinubu was declared the winner of the election, the entire results and accreditation data from polling units had not been transmitted and uploaded by INEC.

Atiku also filed an application for an order to allow the live coverage of the daily court proceedings on the case they brought against the president-elect, Bola Tinubu.

In the motion by his legal team led by Chris Uche, SAN, he specifically applied for “An order directing the Court’s Registry and the parties on modalities for admission of Media Practitioners and their Equipment into the courtroom.”

Atiku, who is a two-time presidential candidate of the PDP, said the petition was a matter of national concern and public interest.