The final written address filed by the counsels of Peter Obi and the Labour Party (LP) has been dismissed by President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s camp.
The dismissal was issued by Wole Olanipekun, counsel to President Bola Tinubu and Vice-President Kashim Shettima, in his response to Obi’s final address.
The response was filed on Friday before the presidential election petition tribunal.
In the response, Olanipekun asked the court to dismiss Obi and LP’s petition and their final written address.
In a 14-page response, Tinubu’s lawyers argued that Obi and LP “abandoned” their petition in their final written address.
As a result, Tinubu’s lawyers asked the court to dismiss their arguments over the “clear manifestation and display of abandonment of the entire petition”.
“Order 22 Rule 5 of the Federal High Court (Civil Procedure) Rules, 2019, which is applicable to the proceedings, mandates that “a written address shall…contain…(c) the issues arising from the evidence for determination,” Tinubu lawyers said.
“From this simple grammatical provision of the rules, it is clear that the petitioners have not formulated any issue for determination capable of being considered or countenanced by this honourable court; and the court can also not consider their address without issues for determination being presented by them.
“Arising from the foregoing, this honourable court is urged, as respondents have done in their final address, to dismiss the petition, not only for the reasons and submissions contained in that address but also for the clear manifestation and display of abandonment of the entire petition,” THEY ADDED.
Going further, the lawyers argued that the president’s forfeiture in the US did not arise from a conviction.
“That Non-Conviction Based Forfeiture (NCBF) of the type referenced in Exhibit P5 [is] typically the outcome of an in rem action and does not involve trial or conviction for an offence,” the lawyers argued.
Also, the lawyers accused Obi and his lawyers of deviating from their earlier allegations.
“Throughout their address, this sweeping statement has not been activated by pointing to any specific Form ECSA, which is caught by their alleged vices, or which contains any figure/votes swapped in favour of the 2nd and 4th respondents, against the petitioners; what the figures are, how the said figures have affected their votes, and how the said conjectured figures have aided the votes of the respondents,” the lawyers said.
“With respect, the entire address, like the petition itself, is a fiction,” they added.
