Election tribunal steps down Peter Obi’s petition over poor schedule of documents

The Presidential Election Petition Court, PEPC has stepped down hearing in the petition filed by the Presidential candidate of Labour Party Mr Peter Obi and the Party against the election of President Ahmed Tinubu.

This is the third time the petition would be stepped down by the Court, following poor schedule of documents being sought to be tendered to establish the allegations of malpractices during the February 25 presidential election.

At Thursday’s proceedings, the Court sitting in Abuja, discovered that the documents were not properly scheduled as ordered by the Court.

In the drama that ensued at the point of tendering the documents from the 23 local government areas of Benue, a lot of discrepancies were uncovered.

All efforts to reconcile the anomaly and reschedule the documents were unsuccessful as the errors were beyond immediate solution.

Counsel to Obi and the Labour Party, Mr. Emeka Okpoko SAN sought to use documents not filed to conduct the proceedings but the move was rejected on the ground of illegality.

In the end, the Court stepped down hearing of the petition and ordered the legal team to go and re- file the schedule of documents in line with the provisions of the pre-hearing report.

The hearing of Obi’s petition had run into stormy waters three times prompting the shift in the hearing of the petition.

Meanwhile, the five Justices led by Justice Haruna Simon Tsammani hearing the petition have retired to their chambers to await the time the LP legal team will put its house in order.