The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) has filed a lawsuit against the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in an effort to prevent the All Progressives Congress (APC) presidential candidate Bola Tinubu and the Labour Party (LP) presidential candidate Peter Obi from choosing Kashim Shettima and Datti Baba-Ahmed as their running mates.
The PDP also requested that the court decide that Kabiru Masari and Doyin Okupe, Tinubu and Obi’s respective former running mates, are required for each of them to be eligible to run for office alone.
The PDP is asking for a court injunction that would prevent the Independent National Electoral Commission from changing Tinubu and Obi’s running mates in the original summons with suit number FHC/ABJ/CS/1016/2022.
In this case, INEC, APC, Tinubu, Masari, Labour Party, Obi, and Okupe are the first to seventh respondents.
Tinubu had chosen Masari to serve as a stand-in so that he could meet the INEC deadline on June 17. Okupe, Obi’s campaign manager, was also put forward as a temporary running mate.
Masari and Okupe resigned after several weeks of discussion, and Tinubu and Obi then proposed Shettima and Baba-Ahmed as replacements.
However, the PDP has asked the court to decide whether Tinubu and Obi are bound by the submission of Masari and Okupe, respectively, as their running mates based on the combined interpretation of Section 142(1) of the constitution, Sections 29(1), 31, and 33 of the Electoral Act 2022, and INEC’s timetable.
One of the reliefs reads: “A declaration that by the combined interpretation of Section 142(1) of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended), Sections 29(1), 31, 33 of the Electoral Act 2022, the 1st defendant’s (INEC’s) election timetable, the 3rd (Tinubu) and 6th (Obi) cannot validly contest the 2023 Presidential election without the 4th (Masari) and 7th (Obi) respondents as their respective running mates.
“The Electoral Act makes no provisions whatsoever for placeholder or temporary running mates. The acts of the 2nd (APC), 3rd (Tinubu), 5th (Labour Party ), and 6th (Obi) defendants in nominating and forwarding the names of the 4th (Masari) and 7th (Okupe) defendants as running mates for the 2023 Presidential elections is valid and subsisting.”
READ ALSO: APC suspends unveiling of Shettima as Tinubu’s running mate
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