TheCable

The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) presidential campaign council says it has asked a court of competent jurisdiction to declare Bola Tinubu, standard-bearer of the All Progressives Congress (APC), ineligible” to contest the election.

In a media conference on Monday in Abuja, Kola Ologbondiyan, spokesperson of the PDP campaign, said the forfeiture of funds by Tinubu to the US government shows that he committed infractions that should disqualify him from running for election.

Over the past few days, court papers about a forfeiture case in the US linked to someone named “Bola Tinubu” surfaced online.

In the documents on a case dating back to 1993, it is alleged that funds traced to the Tinubu in question were linked to proceeds of narcotics trafficking.

The documents also showed that the court ruled that the sum of $460,000 in one of the accounts be forfeited to the US government.

But reacting to the documents, Festus Keyamo, spokesman of the APC presidential campaign council, said the case didn’t prove that Tinubu was linked to illicit drugs.

Keyamo argued that the funds forfeited to the US were tax deductions.

Ologbondiyan said the PDP campaign has also asked the court to compel the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), to remove Tinubu’a name from all materials and documents related to the 2023 presidential election.

“The effect is that the listing of the name of Bola Tinubu, who stands convicted by a court of competent jurisdiction on the ballot for the 2023 presidential election is by the virtue of section 137 (1) (d) of the 1999 constitution (as amended) fundamentally illegal, invalid and must be expunged immediately,” he said.

“Consequently, our campaign has proceeded to the court demanding the court to declare Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, the presidential candidate of the APC, having been convicted, as ineligible to contest the presidential election by virtue of section 137 (1) (d) of the 1999 constitution (as amended).

“Compel the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to immediately delist Asiwaju Tinubu as the presidential candidate of the APC or any other political party for that matter and expunge his name from all materials and documents related to the 2023 presidential election.

“Our campaign is filing for accelerated hearing in this case in the interest of the nation as our laws do not permit a convict, let alone an individual convicted on account of the international crime of trafficking in narcotic, to stand election at any level. Nigeria cannot afford the embarrassment of having a convict hold office at any level against our laws.

“The Atiku/Okowa campaign counsels all those wasting their funds, time, and energy on the APC presidential candidate, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu to put their resources to better use as his gaffe-infested, showboating Presidential ambition has practically come to the end of the road.”