2023 Elections: Yakubu Gowon urges Nigerians to accept Tribunal’s Verdict

 

A former Head of State, General Yakubu Gowon (rtd), has urged Nigerians to accept the decisions of the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal as final.

The hearing of the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal will start on Monday May 8, as Peter Obi of the Labour Party and Atiku Abubakar of the People's Democratic Party challenge president-elect, Bola Ahmed Tinubu's electoral win.

Speaking at a symposium in honour of a one-time Justice of the Supreme Court, Justice Chike Idigbe on Thursday, May 4, Gowon urged Nigerians to allow the courts do its work without interference.

“We need to allow the apex court to come up with their decisions and for the public to be humble enough to accept their decision as final in order to maintain the sanctity of the judiciary as individuals and institutions.

“The litigation tribunals that are now going, let us give the judiciary the opportunity to do their work and let us accept their decisions as it is,” Gowon said.

Following the February 25 presidential election, the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Mahmood Yakubu, had on March 1 declared All Progressives Congress’ Bola Tinubu the President-Elect on the grounds that his party scored the majority of votes cast in the polls.

Tinubu had polled 8.8 million votes to defeat Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) who scored 6.9 million votes, Peter Obi of the Labour Party (LP) who polled 6.1 million votes and 15 others.

However, Atiku and Obi are disputing the result, claiming to be the actual winners of the election.