Supreme court has dismissed the suit by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) seeking the disqualification of Bola Tinubu and Kashim Shettima as presidential and vice-presidential candidates of the All Progressives Congress (APC).
A five-member panel of the apex court held on Friday that the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) lacked the locus standi to institute the suit.
The panel said the PDP is not a member of the APC.
The PDP had claimed that Shettima’s nomination as Tinubu’s running mate was in breach of the provisions of sections 29(1), 33, 35, and 84(1)(2) of the Electoral Act, 2022.
It further argued that Shettima’s nomination to contest the position of vice-president and Borno central senatorial seat at the same time contravened the law.
They prayed the court to nullify Tinubu’s and Shettima’s candidacy.
They also applied for an order to compel the Independent National Electoral Commission to remove their names from the list of nominated or sponsored candidates that were eligible to contest the presidential poll.
Opposing the position by the plaintiff, Lateef Fagbemi SAN contended that the PDP ought to have remained an onlooker no matter its grievance In how the APC nominated its candidates.
“It is abundantly clear that the Appellant in the totality of its position in the instant case, is peeping and poke-nosing into the affairs of another party as a busybody and meddlesome interloper,” he said.
In a unanimous decision of a five-man panel, the court held that an appeal by the PDP challenging the validity of the Tinubu/Shettima ticket lacked merit.
Delivering the lead judgment on the suit, Justice Adamu Jauro upheld the concurrent decisions of the Court of Appeal and the Federal High Court in Abuja, which earlier dismissed the case.
The court ruled that the plaintiff lacked the legal right to meddle in the affairs of the APC which nominated the duo as its candidates in the election and dismissed it.
Describing the appeal as an activity of “a nosy busy-body and a meddlesome interloper, the court stressed that the law does not permit a political party to dabble in the domestic affairs of another party.
The court agreed with the respondents that section 285 (14) (c) of the 1999 Constitution, as amended, and section 149 of the Electoral Act, 2022, did not confer to them the legal right to question the candidature of Shettima on the ground of double nomination.
The apex court held that section 84 of the Electoral Act only empowered an aspirant that participated in the primary election of a political party, to challenge the nomination of a candidate by the party.
The court maintained that the PDP did not prove that its rights were threatened, adding that the party failed to establish the injury it suffered as a result of the nomination by the APC.
More so, the apex court reprimanded the PDP for filing the appeal which it said was frivolous.
It held that evidence before it showed that Shettima duly withdrew as the candidate of the APC in the Borno senatorial election, on July 6, 2022.
Justice Jaurosaid, “From the trial court, down to this court, it has been a waste of precious judicial time.”
He admonished counsel to advise their clients “against filing this sort of suit in future.”
It further awarded in favor of the respondents, the sum of N2 Million damages against the PDP.
