Justice Monica Bolnaan Dongban-Mensem, President of the Court of Appeal, will formally unveil members of the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal (PEPT) on Monday, which will hear all petitions filed against the declaration of Bola Ahmed Tinubu and the All Progressives Congress (APC) as winners of the disputed 2023 presidential election.
This is as the the tribunal begins its very important task at the Court of Appeal Headquarters in Abuja, which is expected to be beefed up with additional security measures.
Since the election tribunal was constituted, Justice Dongban-Mensem had kept the identities of the judges listed to handle the cases off he public eyes, obviously to avoid undue influence on them.
Ahead of the inaugural sitting of the tribunal, the Action Alliance (AA) and its Presidential Candidate in the election, Solomon David Okanigbuan, plans to withdraw their petition against declaration of Tinubu as Nigeria’s President-elect.
The notice of withdrawal of the AA petition is expected to be tabled before the PEPT today.
However, other petitions slated for the pre-hearing session are those of the Action People’s Party (APP) marked CA/PEPC/02/2023, which has Bola Ahmed Tinubu, the All Progressives Congress (APC) and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) as three respondents.
It will be followed by that of Peter Gregory Obi and the Labour Party (LP) marked CA/PEPC/03/2023 with INEC, Senator Bola Ahmed Tinubu, Senator Kashim Shetima and APC as respondents.
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The Allied People’s Movement (APM) is also expected to proceed with its petition marked CA/PEPC/04/2023 against Tinubu.
Defendants in APM’s petition are INEC, APC, Bola Ahmed Tinubu, Kashim Shetima and one Kabir Masari.
It was learnt that the petition by Abubakar Atiku and the People’s Democratic Party (PDP) marked CA/ PEPC/05/2023, will be treated last and has INEC, Tinubu Bola Ahmed and the APC as three respondents.
