The Presidential Election Petition Court sitting in Abuja, has given the former Vice President and presidential candidate of the People’s Democratic Party, PDP, Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, and his Labour Party counterpart three weeks to call their witnesses to prove their case that Tinubu of the APC was not the valid winner of the presidential election.
Both Atiku and Oni have challenged the victory of the former Lagos governor at the February 25 presidential election.
However, Justice Haruna Tsammani-led five-member panel, in its pre-hearing report, on Tuesday, noted that a total of 166 witnesses would be called to testify in the matter.
It stressed that star witnesses in the petition would only be allowed to adopt their written depositions make oral submissions and identify documents where it is required.
The court also gave the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, two days to present its defence, it gave the President-elect, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu and the All Progressives Congress, APC, five days each to defend the petition.
Justice Stephen Adah, who read the pre-hearing report, equally drew attention of the parties to the fact that Atiku’s petition had been merged with the one that was filed by candidate of the Labour Party, LP, Mr. Peter Obi and the one that was filed by the Allied Peoples Movement, APM.
The court held that consolidation of the three petitions would ensure justice in the matter, adding that the parties would adopt their final briefs of argument to enable it to fix a date for judgement.
