The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, have withdrawn a fresh application they had filed to compel the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to allow their agents to participate in the sorting of ballot papers used in the February 25 presidential election. Both the PDP and Atiku are separately challenging the election result, which declared the ruling All Progressives Congress candidate, Bola Tinubu, the winner. They informed the Presidential Election Petition Court, sitting at the Court of Appeal in Abuja, that they wished to discontinue the application.
When the ex parte motion (CA/PEC/10M/2023) was called for hearing on Wednesday, Atiku’s legal team, led by Senior Advocate of Nigeria Joe Kyari Gadzama, notified the court of a notice of discontinuance. Justice Joseph Ikyegh’s three‑member panel then struck out the application.
A member of Atiku’s legal team, who asked to remain unnamed, explained that the decision to withdraw resulted from a meeting his team held with INEC leadership on Tuesday. The original application was filed because the party encountered challenges and administrative bottlenecks at the INEC office when seeking access to election materials that the court had previously granted. “Since that was primarily our prayer in the fresh application we filed, we felt that it would not be necessary to proceed with the hearing. So, to save judicial time, we filed a notice of discontinuance which was accordingly granted,” he said.
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