The late filing of an application by lawyers to Atiku Abubakar and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) stalled the planned hearing on Tuesday of an appeal they filed against the decision of the Presidential Election Petition Court (PEPC).
The appeal is against a ruling of the PEPC, in which it held that the Atiku and the PDP do not have a reply to an application filed on May 14, 2019 by the All Progressives Congress (APC) seeking among others, the dismissal of their (Atiku and the PDP) challenging President Muhammadu Buhari’s victory at the last presidential election.
When the appeal, marked: SC/738/2019 was mentioned on Tuesday, lead lawyer to the appellants, Paul Erokoro (SAN) said he regretted that he filed a fresh “application this morning” for leave to bring supplementary records from the lower court.
Lawyers to the respondents – the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Buhari and the APC said they were just served with the application and needed time to examine it and react appropriately.
A five-man panel of the court, led by Justice Mary Peter-Odili, adjourned until August 20, 2019 for hearing.