TheCable

Hope Democratic Party (HDP) and its presidential candidate in the 2019 general election, Ambrose Owuru, have asked the supreme court to void the inauguration of Bola Tinubu as president of Nigeria.

The appellants are arguing that Tinubu ought not to have been sworn in as president since he is joined as a respondent in the pending suit seeking to declare Owuru as the winner of the 2019 election.

The pending supreme court suit marked SC/667/2023 has former President Muhammadu Buhari, the attorney-general of the federation (AGF), the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and Tinubu as respondents.

On January 30, 2023, Inyang Ekwo, judge of a federal high court in Abuja, dismissed Owuru’s suit for being statute-barred.

The judge described the suit as “baseless, frivolous, irritating, and vexatious in its entirety”.

Dissatisfied, the HDP candidate approached the court of appeal.

On May 25, a three-member panel of the court of appeal also dismissed the suit for being frivolous.

The appellate court held that the appellant’s grievances against the 2019 presidential election were not only strange but uncalled for because they had been pursued up to the supreme court and were dismissed for want of merit.

The appeal court held that Owuru’s bid to resuscitate the case that died in 2019 was aimed at making the lower courts go on a collision course with the supremacy of the apex court.

The court ordered the appellant to pay N10 million each to former President Buhari, the AGF, INEC and Tinubu — the first to fourth defendants in the suit.

Owuru further appealed to the apex court.

In a motion on notice served on Tinubu through his lawyer, Wole Olanipekun, the ex-presidential candidate is also praying the supreme court for an order restraining the respondents and particularly, Tinubu from further operating the federation account pending the determination and resolution of the constitutional questions against the 2023 elections.