Headline

Tribunal Strikes Out LP’s Case Against Tinubu, Reads Atiku’s Petitions

Published

2 years ago

September 6, 2023

Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), Peter Obi of the Labour Party (LP), and the Allied Peoples Movement (APM) are challenging President Bola Tinubu’s declaration as the winner of the 2023 presidential election.

The Presidential Election Petitions Tribunal (PEPT) is set to deliver judgement today. Security is already beefed up ahead of the verdict.

Nigerians from all walks of life are waiting eagerly to witness the televised live proceedings from the Tribunal venue at the Court of Appeal in Abuja, the nation’s capital.

Kindly refresh the page for live updates of the Presidential Election Petitions Tribunal (PEPT)’s judgement

5:27 pm Justice Ugo begins to highlight faults in Atiku’s petition, saying it is filed with generic allegations.

According to him, the petition did not list polling units where election malpractices happened.

05:04 pm The court starts judgement on Atiku’s petition

One of the five-man panel Justice Moses Ugo is reading the judgement in Atiku’s case against President Bola Tinubu.

05:01 pm: ‘You Can’t Interrupt Court Judgment’, Tribunal Shuts Down APC’s Lawyer

05:52 pm: Tribunal Strikes Out LP’s Petition Against Tinubu’s Win

The Tribunal struck out the Labour Party’s petitions against Tinubu’s win in the presidential election for lack of merit.

04:37 pm: The petitioners have failed to establish their allegations of overvoting and voter suppression, the court ruled.

4:03 pm: The court is highlighting issues of corruption which Obi claimed were recorded in the elections. They include vote suppression, inflation of results, and over-voting.

But Just Tsammani said some paragraphs relating to these claims have been struck out earlier due to their vague and generic nature.

3:41 pm: The PEPT ruled that Obi failed to establish that INEC intentionally refused to quickly upload polling unit results to IReV so as to alter the results in Tinubu’s favour.

“The petitioner made the allegation of non-compliance a substantial part of their case. By the provisions of Section 135(2) of the Electoral Act, they are required to show how such noncompliance substantially affected them. If they fail to show the same, the petition fails,” the court ruled.

3:12 pm: According to the PEPT, INEC regulations and the Electoral Act give room for manual collation of results. It said electronic transmission is optional at best.

3:08 pm: The court added that the only device that must be used by INEC for elections is the Bimodal Voters Accreditation System (BVAS)

It noted that there’s no regulation showing BVAS must be used to electronically transmit results from polling units.

02: 41 pm: INEC At Liberty To Define Mode Of Transmitting Election Results – Court

APC Excluded As INEC Publishes Names Of Rivers Senatorial Candidates
A file photo of a ballot box.

On the issue of substantial non-compliance with the provisions of the law, especially with regard to non-transmission of result sheets to INEC Result Viewing Portal (IReV), the court holds that there is no law that says INEC must transfer or transmit the results of the election from the polling units electronically.

The law simply empowers INEC to decide the means of collation of results of elections, the court argued.

02: 26 pm: Obi, LP Failed To Prove Tinubu Was Convicted In US, Tribunal Rules

The Presidential Election Petitions Court on Wednesday ruled that the Labour Party (LP) and its presidential candidate, Peter Obi, failed to prove that President Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress (APC) was convicted for money laundering in the United States.

The five-man panel led by Justice Haruna Tsammani ruled that no record of criminal arrest or conviction was established against Tinubu by the petitioners – Obi and the LP.

02:12 pm: Tribunal dismisses LP/Obi’s Petition on 25 per cent needed to win the presidential election.

According to the court, FCT residents have no special privileges as the petitioners claimed.

1:28 pm: The court has rejected the reports of forensic analyses tendered by LP’s three witnesses. According to the court, they are either made during the pendency of the case or by an interested party.

This is as it rejected the European Union report on the polls, arguing that it was not tendered by an official of the body.

12:31 pm: Tribunal Declares APC’s Petition On Obi’s Membership Incompetent

The Court also declared APC’s petition challenging Obi’s membership of the LP as incompetent. Justice Abba says membership in a political party is an internal affair.

The Tribunal also touched on the issue of non-joinder of Atiku Abubakar who came second and wondered how Obi & LP’s petition could be effectively determined without joining the candidate who placed second in the polls

12: 07 p.m. LP’s Widespread Irregularities Claim Generic – Court

While highlighting a claim by the respondents that Obi’s petition only alleged that there were widespread irregularities without giving the particulars and the polling units.

Justice Abba Mohammed holds that In a presidential election held in 176,866 polling units in 774 Local Government Areas, it would be improper not to specify where there were irregularities.

According to him, the petitioners only made generic allegations.

“Pleading must set out material facts and particulars. In the instant petition, there was no effort to prove specific allegations, particulars of complaints,” said the Tribunal.

The law is clear that where someone alleges irregularities in a particular polling unit, such person must prove the particular irregularities in that polling unit before that petition can succeed, the Tribunal added.

The court said the petitioners did not prove the particular polling unit where the election did not take place nor did they specify particulars of polling units where there are alleged complainants of irregularities.

“It was only in one instance that figures were given of alleged suppressed votes and we all know that elections are about figures,” it said.

“LP alleged that INEC reduced their scores and added it to APC votes but failed to supply particulars of what they actually scored before the said reductions, neither did they supply the polling units where it happened….”

Headline

India Issues Health Alert After Spike In ‘brain-eating’ Amoeba Deaths

Published

7 minutes ago

September 18, 2025

Editor

India has issued a health alert after infections and deaths caused by a rare water-borne “brain-eating” amoeba doubled compared to last year in the southern state of Kerala.

Numbers are still tiny but Altaf Ali, a doctor who is part of a government task force to arrest the spread, told AFP that officials were “conducting tests on a large scale across the state to detect and treat cases”.

Officials reported 19 deaths and 72 infections of the Naegleria fowleri amoeba this year, including nine deaths and 24 cases in September alone.

Last year, the amoeba killed nine people out of 36 reported cases.

The US Centres for Disease Control and Prevention says it is often called a “brain-eating amoeba” because it can “infect the brain and destroy brain tissue”.

If the amoeba reaches the brain, it can cause an infection that kills over 95 per cent of those affected.

Infections are “very rare but nearly always fatal”, the CDC notes.

The amoeba lives in warm lakes and rivers and is contracted by contaminated water entering the nose. It does not spread from person to person.

The World Health Organisation says that symptoms include headache, fever and vomiting, which rapidly progresses to “seizures, altered mental status, hallucinations, and coma”.

“It’s worrying that new cases this year have emerged from across the state, as opposed to specific pockets in the past,” Ali said.

Since 1962, nearly 500 cases have been reported worldwide, mostly in the United States, India, Pakistan, and Australia.

AFP

Headline

Gunmen On Motorbikes Kill 22 At Baptism Ceremony In Niger

Published

22 hours ago

September 17, 2025

Editor

Gunmen on motorbikes shot dead 22 villagers in western Niger, most attending a baptism ceremony, local media and other sources said Tuesday.

The shootings happened on Monday in the Tillaberi region, near Burkina Faso and Mali, where jihadist groups linked to Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State group (IS) are active.

A resident of the area told AFP that 15 people were killed first at a baptism ceremony in Takoubatt village.

“The attackers then went to the outskirts of Takoubatt where they killed seven other people,” said the resident, who requested anonymity for security reasons.

Local media outlet Elmaestro TV reported a “gruesome death toll of 22 innocent people cowardly killed without reason or justification”.

“Once again, the Tillaberi region has been struck by barbarism, plunging innocent families into mourning and despair,” Nigerien human rights campaigner Maikoul Zodi said on social media.

Niger’s military leaders, who came to power two years ago in a coup, have struggled to contain jihadist groups in Tillaberi, despite maintaining a large army presence there.

Around 20 soldiers were killed in the region last week.

Human Rights Watch has urged Niger authorities to “do more to protect” civilians against deadly attacks.

The rights monitoring group estimates that the Islamic State group has “summarily executed” more than 127 villagers and Muslim worshippers in Tillaberi in five attacks since March.

Meanwhile, the NGO ACLED, which tracks conflict victims worldwide, says around 1,800 people have been killed in attacks in Niger since October 2024 — three-quarters of them in Tillaberi.

Niger and its neighbours, Burkina Faso and Mali, also ruled by military coup leaders who claim to pursue a sovereignist policy, have expelled the French and American armies that were fighting alongside them against jihadism.

AFP

Headline

Serbia Indicts Ex-minister, 12 Others Over Train Station Tragedy

Published

2 days ago

September 16, 2025

Editor

Serbian prosecutors filed an updated indictment on Tuesday against 13 people, including a former minister, over a fatal railway station roof collapse that has triggered a wave of anti-government protests.

The prosecution said all those indicted, among them former construction minister Goran Vesic, face charges of “serious crimes against public safety” over the tragedy that killed 16 people last November.

“The indictment proposes that the Higher Court in Novi Sad order custody for all the defendants,” the prosecutor’s office said in a statement.

The roof collapse at the newly renovated station in Serbia’s second-largest city, Novi Sad, became a symbol of entrenched corruption and sparked almost daily protests.

Protesters first demanded a transparent investigation, but their calls soon escalated into demands for early elections.

The Higher Public Prosecutor’s Office in Novi Sad initially filed an indictment at the end of December, but judges returned it in April, requesting more information.

The accused were released or placed under house arrest following the decision.

The prosecutor’s office said it had complied with the judge’s request and had now completed the supplementary investigation.

The prosecutor specialising in organised crime and corruption in Belgrade is leading a separate, independent investigation into the tragedy.

That investigation is focused on 13 people, including Vesic and another former minister, Tomislav Momirovic, who headed the Construction Ministry before him.

In March, the European Public Prosecutor’s Office (EPPO) launched a third, separate investigation into the possible misuse of EU funds for the station’s reconstruction.

AFP