President Bola Tinubu has been dragged before the Supreme Court for allegedly presenting himself for inauguration as president in spite of a pending legal action against the conduct of the February 25 2023 election.
Citing the doctrine of Lis Pendens, the presidential candidate of Hope Democratic Party (HDP) in the 2019 general election, Chief Albert Owuru wants the apex court to nullify the inauguration of Tinubu as winner of the 2023 election.
Owuru, a constitutional lawyer, is contending that the election which produced Tinubu was an exercise in futility and illegal self help in view of his yet-to-be-determined suit against Tinubu and others at the Supreme Court.
The pending Supreme Court suit numbered, SC/667/2023 has Chief Owuru and his party, HDP as appellants, while respondents are former President Muhammadu Buhari, Attoney General of the Federation (AGF), the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), and Asiwaju Bola Tinubu.
Owuru is arguing that Tinubu’s declaration as president by INEC is an affront to the Supreme Court and the established law by reason of lis pendens, adding that since Tinubu is a party in the pending suit before the Apex Court, he ought not to have presented himself for inauguration in respect of any presidential election.
Owuru contested the 2019 election on the platform of HDP against former President Buhari and claimed to be the adjudged winner of the election as against the declaration of Buhari made by INEC.
His suit seeking an order of Court to declare him as the adjudged and constitutional winner of the 2019 election and currently pending before the Supreme Court, was on May 18 this year, voluntarily joined by Tinubu as an interested party.
In a motion on notice served on Tinubu through the Chambers of Chief Wole Olanipekun (SAN), 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 presidential election.
Owuru predicated his grouse against inauguration of Tinubu or anybody else as successor to Buhari on the ground that he is the constitutionally adjudged winner of the said election and has not spent his four year tenure as required by law.
Among others, Owuru had insisted then, that Buhari was usurping his tenure of office since 2019 because the Supreme Court has not determined his petition filed in 2019 in which he challenged the purported declaration of Buhari as the winner of the election.
His first suit was dismissed by Justice Inyang Ekwo of the Federal High Court in Abuja on January 30, 2023 prompting his movement to the Court of Appeal.
The Court of Appeal in Abuja, in its own part on May 25, in a judgment delivered by Justice Jamil Tukur who led a three-member panel had refused to stop the May 29 inauguration of Tinubu.
Justice Tukur had held that Owuru engaged in gross abuse of court process by filing a frivolous, vexatious and irritating suit to provoke the respondents.
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