INEC presents certificate of return to President-elect, Bola Ahmed Tinubu
7 PDP Governors have withdrawn suit challenging Tinubu’s election victory.
Newsone reports that seven Peoples Democratic Party-led states, which filed a suit against the Federal Government at the Supreme Court challenging the victory of the President-Elect, Bola Tinubu, at Saturday’s presidential poll, have discontinued the suit.
In the suit, which had the Attorneys-General of the seven states as plaintiffs and the Attorney-General of the Federation as defendant, the seven states, which include Adamawa, Akwa Ibom, Bayelsa, Delta, Edo, Taraba and Sokoto states, had asked the Supreme Court to intervene in the just concluded presidential election, claiming that the declaration of Tinubu did not follow the provisions of the Electoral Act 2022 and the Independent National Electoral Commission’s guidelines, according to a ThisDay Live report.
The suit was challenging the failure of INEC to upload the election results to the IReV through the BVAS. They also expressed fear of a potential breakdown of public order and civil disobedience.
The Notice of Discontinuance, which was signed by their lawyer, Mr. Mike Ozekhome, on Friday, said, “Take notice that the plaintiffs doth hereby wholly discontinue this suit against the defendant herein…”
Meanwhile, Newsone had reported earlier that the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) has declared the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) as the winner of the 2023 presidential election.
This online news platform understands that the Chairman of INEC, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu declared Bola Tinubu the winner at exactly 4.10 am today in Abuja. By this declaration, Tinubu would be the 16th leader of Nigeria since independence in 1960.
The former Lagos state governor polled total votes of 8,794,726 to defeat his closest rival and the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Atiku Abubakar who scored 6,984,520 votes, and Peter Obi of Labour party who polled 6,101,533 votes.
Newsone Nigeria reports that the presidential candidate of the New Nigerian Peoples Party (NNPP), Rabiu Kwankwaso came a distant fourth with total votes of 1,496,687 votes.
Yakubu said the registered voters for the election were 93,469,008, while 25,286,616 voters were accredited.
The INEC Chairman put the total valid votes at 24,025,940, while the total rejected votes were 939,278. He said the total number of votes cast was 24,965,218.
He declared: “I certify that I am the returning officer for the 2023 presidential election held on the 25th of February 2003.
“That Tinubu Bola Ahmed of the APC, having satisfied the requirements of the law is hereby declared the winner and returned elected. The Certificate of Return to the president-elect and Vice president-elect will take place here at 3 pm today.”
INEC Chairman, Mahmood Yakubu, also subsequently issued Mr. Tinubu a “Certificate of Return” the same day.