Election Petition: PDP To Close Case On Thursday

Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, will close their case on Thursday, June 22.

Gatekeepers News reports that the development followed the decision of the court to add two extra days to the party, after losing the said days during the matter.

According to the timetable, PDP was scheduled to close its case Tuesday, but due to the Democracy Day holiday on Monday, June 12, and last Saturday, they lost two days meant to tender documents and field witnesses.

According to PDP, Chris Uche, the party had fielded 25 witnesses and would make it a round number of 30. The 70 remaining witnesses would come in the form of tendered documents.

Earlier, the opposition party lamented the difficulties encountered in getting Certified True Copies (CTCs) of documents out of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in aid of their petition challenging the declaration of President Bola Tinubu.

At the resumed hearing at the Presidential Election Petitions Tribunal (PEPT) on Tuesday, Uche said INEC brought the CTC of the voter register for the Federal Capital Territory, although not all, adding that they wished to tender them as exhibits.

INEC, the All Progressives Congress (APC), and Counsel to Tinubu all objected to the admissibility of the document. The court however admitted it as evidence.

The PDP’s Counsel further expressed displeasure that they had applied for a CTC of a subpoena since May 26 and INEC had just produced it, making it difficult to work on.

INEC however accused the party/Atiku of not paying for the certification and are accusing the commission of delaying the documents. The counsel further added that they have called INEC officials from across Nigeria to assemble all the documents

The case has been adjourned till Wednesday, June 21 for the continuation of hearing.