Following a brief meeting, the Edo State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal (EPT) reopened its session on Monday and postponed until Wednesday, January 15, 2025, to begin a full hearing on the petition submitted by Dr. Asue Ighodalo and his Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) contesting the election results of Governor Monday Okpebholo on September 21, 2024.
Lead attorneys petitioned the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and Governor Monday Okpebholo, the petition’s first and second respondents, for the adjournment, and the court granted it.
The PDP, the second petitioner, and Dr. Ighodalo, the first petitioner, are contesting INEC’s announcement that Okpebholo had won the election. Ighodalo of the PDP received 247,274 votes, while Okpebholo received 291,667, according to INEC.
Remember that on December 21, the three-member EPT led by Justice Wilfred Kpochi postponed the hearing on the petition and other petitions until January 13, 2025, after the pre-hearing of all petitions was completed.
The Assistant Secretary to the Tribunal, Dayo Dahunsi Esq., notified the Court during the start of the hearing in Benin on Monday that the Ist Respondent and the Second Respondent had a pending plea to adjourn the meeting until Wednesday, January 15, 2025. The application, he said, was premeditated on the assumption that the two applicants’ lead attorneys would appear before the Supreme Court on Tuesday, January 24, 2025, in a case scheduled for a definitive hearing.
Dahunsi quoted the applicants to have said that their requests also applied to other petitions against their clients before the Tribunal.
Reacting to the application, Oladipo Oshinowo, who held the brief of the lead counsel of the petitioners, Ken. Mozia SAN, said he was not opposing the application in the spirit of cooperation.
“Though, we are ready and prepared to commence trails today, a copy of the letter seeking for adjournment was to our lead counsel by the registry late yesterday, wherein the 1st and second respondents are seeking for an adjournment.
“We are constrained to concede to this request for adjournment on the strength of the undertaking that such request for adjournment shall not be made by the respondents in future,” he said.
Counsel to the 3rd respondent (All Progressives Congress), Josephine Ogagaworia, did not object to the application as Justice Kpochi adjourned sitting to Wednesday for actual hearing of the petition.
