Placeholder: Court rejects PDP’s plea to disqualify Tinubu, Obi

A Federal High Court in Abuja has refused to disqualify the candidates of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Bola Tinubu and his Labour Party (LP) counterpart, Peter Obi, from participating in the 2023 presidential election.

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) had approached the court, accusing both Obi and Tinubu of acting in breach of the Electoral Act by failing to nominate running mates in time and picking Kabiru Masari and Doyin Okupe as their placeholders respectively.

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Justice Donatus Okorowo, on Monday, held that the application lacked merit and was an abuse of court process as the court lacked jurisdiction to entertain the matter.

PDP had contended that APC and LP were in breach of Section 142 of the Nigerian Constitution, which provides that a person cannot be validly elected as president except he nominates another candidate as his associate from the same political party.

The APC had in June nominated Masari as its temporary running mate while LP nominated Okupe in the same place ahead of INEC’s deadline of June 17 for the submission of lists of candidates.

Both names were eventually replaced with Kashim Shettima and Ahmed Datti Baba-Ahmed nominated as the running mates respectively ahead of the window for substitutions.