2027 eligibility suit: Atiku gets order to serve Tinubu with court papers through APC

Justice Inyang Edem Ekwo of the Federal High Court in Abuja has granted the request by former Vice President and presidential candidate of African Democratic Congress, ADC, Atiku Abubakar, to serve court documents on President Bola Tinubu through his political party, the All Progressives Congress, APC.

Justice Ekwo on Wednesday granted the request while ruling on an ex-parte application brought by Atiku in a suit he filed in his name and that of his party, the ADC, seeking to disqualify Tinubu from contesting the January 16, 2027 presidential election.

Atiku’s lawyer, Omotayo Ojo, who held the brief of Silas Onu, had informed the court that the plaintiff would effect service within seven days.

Ruling on the application, Justice Ekwo ordered that service should be done within seven days and adjourned till September 28 for mention.

Onu had on September 1 told the court that his client was yet to serve the suit’s originating documents on Tinubu personally.

The lawyer said he required an order of court to serve the documents on President Tinubu through substituted means.

Listed along with Tinubu as defendants in the suit marked FHC/ABJ/CS/1888/2026 are the APC and the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC.

Tinubu, APC and INEC have since responded to the suit by filing counter-affidavits and preliminary objections, querying the competence of the suit and praying the court to dismiss it.

In a joint counter affidavit filed on September 9, President Tinubu and APC prayed the court to dismiss the suit on the grounds that it is incompetent and that the plaintiffs lacked the locus standi to institute the case.

The defendants denied submitting any forged certificate to INEC for the 2023 and 2027 presidential elections.

President Tinubu and the APC stated that they did not submit any Form CF001 to INEC for 2023 or 2027 poll as claimed by the plaintiffs.

They further stated that the National Youth Service Corps, NYSC, has never denied issuing discharge certificate to the 1st defendant at the end of his service year.

The duo argued that contrary to paragraph 27 of the affidavit in support of the originating summons, no constitutional provision had been breached nor had any injustice been done to the plaintiffs by the 1st and 2nd defendant’s action of submission of the President’s personal particulars to INEC.

Tinubu and APC, also in a written address attached to the application and filed by Chief Akin Olujinmi, SAN, raised a number of objections to the suit.

Olujinmi observed that though the plaintiffs’ complaint is an allegation of forgery which is no doubt a crime, such allegation must be proved beyond reasonable doubt, citing Section 135(1) of the Evidence Act, among others.

He said it is a settled law that the evidence required to prove that a certificate is forged is a disclaimer from the institution that is said to have issued the certificate, citing a previous Supreme Court decision to back his argument.

According to Olujinmi, without evidence from the institution or body that is purported to have issued the certificate or other document stating that it did not issue the certificate or document or that any part of the certificate or document is not made by it, it would be idle and useless to contend that it is forged.

He said the apex court had also held that “in order to prove forgery, or that a document is forged, two documents must be produced viz: the document from which the forgery was (a) made; and (b) the forgery or the forged document”.

The lawyer submitted that in the instant case, Atiku and ADC had produced no evidence from NYSC disclaiming issuance of discharge certificate to the 1st defendant.

He stated that the suit is hypothetical and academic in nature and devoid of real facts.

Olujinmi, who described the suit as “incompetent, being a pre-election matter”, said the plaintiffs lacked the “locus standi” to challenge President Tinubu’s APC candidacy.

He prayed the court to uphold the preliminary objection and dismiss the suit.

INEC, in its preliminary objection filed on September 7 by its lawyer, Dr. Alex Izinyon, SAN, challenged the competence of the suit on the grounds of statute-bar, want of locus standi, absence of a reasonable cause of action and abuse of court process.

The commission also argued that the plaintiffs failed to comply with the mandatory written deposition requirement under Paragraph 7(1) of the Federal High Court Pre-Election Practice Directions (Amendment) 2026.

The electoral umpire equally challenged the propriety of reliefs two and three in the plaintiffs’ originating summons.