Key Highlights
- Owuru predicated his opposition to Tinubu’s inauguration as successor to Buhari on the ground that he is the constitutionally adjudged winner of the 2019 election and has not spent his tenure as required by law.
- He insisted that Buhari had been usurping his tenure of office since 2019 because the Supreme Court had not determined his petition filed in 2019 wherein he challenged Buhari’s victory.
- He also applied for another order placing on notice that any form of the inauguration, organised by Buhari on May 29, 2023, remains and is viewed as an “interim placeholder” administration
A fresh motion on notice seeking to stop the president-elect, Bola Tinubu, from being inaugurated as Nigeria’s next president on May 29, has been instituted at the Court of Appeal in Abuja.
The new suit marked CA/CV/259/2023 was instituted by Ambrose Owuru, a former presidential candidate and constitutional lawyer who ran for the presidency under the platform of the Hope Democratic Party in 2019.
Listed as respondents in the motion on notice are President Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), the Attorney-General of the Federation (AGF) and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami, and the Independent National Electoral Commission as 1st to 3rd respondents respectively.
What the complainant is seeking
Owuru in the suit is praying the Court of Appeal to prohibit President Buhari, the AGF and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) from inaugurating the 2023 President-elect on May 29, claiming that he was the valid winner of the 2019 election and had not spent his tenure as required by law.
Consequently, he is seeking to stop any other move towards the inauguration of Tinubu or anybody else as successor to Buhari.
Among other things, Owuru insisted that Buhari had been usurping his tenure of office since 2019 because the Supreme Court had not determined his petition filed in 2019 wherein he challenged Buhari’s victory.
Anybody inaugurated as president will be interim placeholder
In his motion on notice, Owuru applied for
- “An order of prohibitory injunction compelling Buhari, AGF and INEC, their servants, agents and privies to preserve and give due cognizance and abstain from any further undertaking or engaging in any act of usurpation of adjudged acquired Constitutional rights and mandate as the winner of the 2019 presidential election.”
He also applied for another order placing on notice that any form of inauguration, organised by Buhari on May 29, 2023 remains and is viewed as an “interim placeholder” administration arranged pending the hearing and determination of his substantive appeal on the constitutional interpretation thereof.
The motion is supported by an eight-paragraph affidavit praying the Court of Appeal for an expeditious hearing before the inauguration of Tinubu.
The affidavit deposed to by an Abuja-based legal practitioner, Adebayo Anafowode, and filed at the Court of Appeal in Abuja, expressed apprehension that Owuru’s suit against Buhari would be rendered nugatory unless given a quick hearing.
- The affidavit partly reads, “That the applicant (Owuru) is the adjudged 1st in time constitutional winner of the February 16, 2019, presidential election reserves the right of first refusal over any later presidential election returns in the face of usurpation of adjudged acquired constitutional rights.”
No date has been fixed for the hearing of the suit yet.
Who is 100% clean among all the presidential candidates, all of them have got skeleton in their cupboard, the court should throw the stupid petition into the bin,nobody should drag the country back,we want to move forward, we need economic progress immediately
While I don’t understand the basis of this petition (apparently based on the 2019 elections) and expect it to be speedily disposed of, why do so many Nigerians seem willing (even eager) to settle for MEDIOCRITY?
If none of the presidential candidates are “100% clean” as you profess, then throw them all OUT! Frankly, the realization that the probable next Nigerian president had to forfeit narcotics-related funds in the US is SCANDALOUS!
Without prejudice to anyone or any candidate, the notion that Nigeria will achieve “economic progress immediately” under dirty and corrupt leadership is the sort of collective delusion Nigerians should seriously rid themselves of.