A Federal High Court in Abuja has scheduled a ruling for November 20 on a request that former Vice President and presidential candidate of the African Democratic Congress (ADC), Atiku Abubakar, filed to enable him amend the suit in which he is seeking to, among others, stop President Bola Ahmed Tinubu from participating in the next presidential election.
Justice Inyang Ekwo chose the date yesterday after lawyers to the parties made the final submissions on the application Atiku and the ADC filed for permission to amend their suit.
Listed as defendants in the suit are: President Tinubu; his party, the All Progressives Congress (APC); and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC). FollowPolitics
At yesterday’s hearing, lawyer to Atiku and the ADC, Joseph Silas, adopted his written address and urged the court to grant the application for amendment.
Silas said the amendment his client was seeking aimed to allow the plaintiffs to supply more evidence and correct some errors in the documents earlier filed.
The plaintiffs filed the application on September 10, seeking leave to amend their originating summons and have the proposed amended process deemed properly filed.
Atiku and the ADC claimed to have discovered errors in the original suit, including referring to an INEC form as Form CF001 instead of Form EC9A.
They stated that the amendment was necessary to set out the particulars of the alleged fraud, include a written deposition by Atiku and attach clearer copies of exhibits that were unavailable when the suit was filed.
In their submissions, Wole Olanipekun (SAN), for President Tinubu; Akin Olujinmi (SAN), for the APC, and Alex Izinyon (SAN), for INEC, urged the court to decline the plaintiffs’ request. FollowPolitics
The lawyers to the defendants argued that the plaintiffs’ intention was to surreptitiously alter the nature of the suit, to which they had already filed responses.
President Tinubu, in a counter-affidavit filed by Olanipekun, argued that contrary to the plaintiffs’ claim that the amendment was filed to rectify typographical errors, they also planned to extend the alteration to the questions for determination and reliefs sought in the originating summons.
He added that Atiku sought to introduce an entirely new relief, which was not sought in the earlier originating summons, with which the action was initiated.
“I also observed that the plaintiffs seek to introduce new documents through the affidavit, by substituting Form CF001 for Form EC9, while seeking to introduce entirely new paragraphs in the supporting affidavit to the originating summons.”
According to him, the amendments the plaintiffs sought to make were attempts to alter the entire case of the plaintiffs as presented before the court.
“The entire facts deposed to in the affidavit in support of the motion on notice, including paragraphs 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, and 13, are untrue, misconceived, or skewed to mislead this honourable court,” he said.
The President noted that the plaintiffs made it clear that their purported cause of action is predicated on the documents submitted by the President to INEC.
He argued that Atiku’s substantive suit was statute-barred, having been filed on August 14 while the cause of action, which he was challenging, arose on July 11 when President Tinubu’s name was submitted to INEC, even though the commission published the particulars of all presidential candidates with their submitted certificates on August 1. FollowPolitics
According to him, the timeline for institution of actions is prescribed by the 1999 Constitution (as amended) and not the Practice Direction of the court.
“The Practice Direction does not entitle any party to file or seek to amend their originating summons upon the expiration of the time prescribed by the Constitution for the institution of the action,” he added.
Besides, the defendant argued that contrary to Atiku’s reliefs, the amendment sought more than just “to correct errors of description of documents”.
He added: “The attempt to ‘set out the particulars of fraud in the affidavit’ is an admission to the fact that the previously filed originating summons contained no such particulars, thus, rendering same incompetent.”
He submitted that an incompetent originating process cannot be amended, adding that the proposed amended originating summons clearly indicated that an additional prayer is being sought therein.
The APC also raised similar issues in its counter-affidavit, while INEC, represented by Alex Izinyon (SAN), argued that Atiku’s motion to amend and the proposed amended originating summons were meant to substitute or bring in a new cause of action.
INEC added that the motion sought to attach a written deposition not filed within the constitutionally prescribed period, reformulate reliefs and cure the CF001/EC9 confusion.
It argued that the proposed amendment, if granted, would have the effect of introducing a fresh or different cause of action.
INEC noted that in the alternative, the motion, if granted, has the effect of curing a jurisdictional defect after the expiration of the 14-day period prescribed by Section 285(9) of the Constitution for instituting a pre-election suit.
Atiku and the ADC are, in the substantive suit, seeking, among others, an order disqualifying President Tinubu and the APC from participating in the 2027 presidential election.
They questioned President Tinubu’s National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) discharge certificate submitted to INEC by the APC.
Atiku, in a supporting affidavit, alleged that President Tinubu submitted to INEC an NYSC discharge certificate bearing the name “Tinubu Bola Adekunle,” which, according to him, is different from the President’s name – Bola Ahmed Tinubu.
He alleged that the same NYSC certificate was submitted in connection with the 2027 presidential election, claiming that the document is not a certificate obtained by President Tinubu.
