Labour Party’s presidential candidate, Peter Obi, has formally filed his petition to the elections tribunal to protest the outcome of the February 25 poll.
Chief Spokesperson of the Obi-Datti Presidential Campaign Council, Dr Yunusa Tanko, disclosed this in a statement.
According to the statement, “It is official the Labour Party presidential candidate, Peter Obi has filed his petition to the presidential elections tribunal in Abuja. The process of reclaiming the people’s mandate has started.”
Obi’s petition is coming about a month after the contentious presidential and National Assembly elections that produced the President-elect, Asiwaju Bola Tinubu.
Tanko did not reveal why it took the LP presidential flagbearer this long to file the petition, but a source within the party disclosed that the former governor of Anambra State wanted to properly collate materials to back up his claim of massive rigging, voters intimidation and corruption allegation against INEC.
“You know Obi doesn’t like talking without getting facts. That’s why he took his time before he officially filed his case at the tribunal,” he said.
Tanko had said last week that the lawyers of the LP presidential candidate were making progress with their inspection of electoral data after they were granted access to gather some relevant information from the materials supplied.
He made the statement after the legal team met with INEC Chairman, Prof. Mahmood Yakubu, who promised that the commission would give the legal team access to the materials.
At the parley, the head of the legal delegation, Dr Livy Uzoukwu, who led 60 lawyers to the meeting had urged the commission to urgently make the polls materials available as the team was running against the deadline to file its petition against the outcome of the presidential poll.