Tribunal dismisses Atiku’s application, closes case

Lanre Adewole, Abuja - 30.11.2007

A five-man panel of the Court of Appeal serving as the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal sitting in Abuja on Thursday dismissed an application filed by former Vice President Atiku Abubakar seeking to put some witnesses in the box to testify in his petition challenging the election of President Umaru Yar’Adua.

Atiku, candidate of the Action Congress (AC) in the April 21 presidential election, had requested to have in the witness box for oral evidence, officials of the Nigeria Airspace Management Agency (NAMA), Nigerian Security, Minting and Printing Company (NSMPC), foreign election monitors and some media chiefs.

Despite granting him the subpoena issued on the affected persons, the tribunal only allowed Atiku’s legal team to tender from the Bar, the documents requested from those subpoenaed.

Atiku closed his case against the election of Yar’Adua after his application to call the witnesses, whose depositions did not form part of his petition, was successfully challenged by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and President Yar’Adua and Vice-President Jonathan Goodluck.

The presiding justice of the court, Justice A.O. Ogebe had, in his ruling on the application, held that Atiku’s motion did not meet the expectations of the Fourth Schedule to the Practice Direction issued on the hearing of petition arising from the election, regarding the tendering of documents and calling of witnesses.