Today was indeed a really bad day for Mr Oyetola's lawyers at the Tribunal as they were jolted and thrown off balance with the submissions and erudition of Counsel to the PDP and Senator Ademola Adeleke.

The nullification judgement of the Federal High Court Abuja was hung effectively on Oyetola's neck and his team were visibly shaken when top SANs assembled by the Respondents stormed the hearing with decades of experience and invoked their expertise in electoral matters. During the proceedings, even PDP took pity on the lead counsel to Oyetola lawyer who was totally disoriented during the legal firestorm.

It was so bad that at a point the Governor's lawyers lost grasp of procedural processes until legal luminary, Sir Alex Iziyon, came to their aid, tutoring them on stages and steps in procedural handling.

It all started when the Tribunal resumed hearing and the PDP/Adeleke team called attention to the many applications before the court waiting for action and which on their own may also be dragged up to the Supreme Court.

Sir Iziyon, SAN, had sought the leave of the Tribunal to move an oral application calling the attention of the Tribunal to the Abuja Federal High Court judgment which nullified the candidature of Mr Oyetola at the July 16 elections. The SAN had submitted that that judgement is very critical amd may supersede all current applications before the Tribunal because it has swept off the whole essence of the existence of the Tribunal as far as Oyetola's petition is concerned.

Sensing the trend of the presentation, the jolted counsel of Oyetola quickly raised the need for the application to be filed instead of oral, even though Sir Iziyon was ready to move the motion orally.

The defence push created real time disruption for the petitioner's counsel especially as Oyetola has no proof of appeal against the judgement. He also does not have any document to prove stay of execution of the very devastating judgement.

The Tribunal had to concede to the need for the defence to file the application which the defence team is to do tomorrow. The certified true copy of the nullification judgement is to be filed by the defence to validate a reality that there is no petition before the lord justices.

Meanwhile the Respondents have filed separate preliminary objections praying for a striking out or dismissal of the petition for incompetence. The Tribunal later adjourned till 13th October, 2022 for continuation of Pre-Hearing.

Chinjo2:
What is even the essence of appealing this judgement? Adeleke won that election clean and square.