Allow Tribunals, Supreme Court work – Gowon warns politicians

Former military head of state, Yakubu Gowon has urged aggrieved candidates in the 2023 general election to accept the outcome of the election petition tribunals and the Supreme Court.

Gowon made this plea on Thursday, while speaking at the 15th edition of Punuka annual lecture 2023 in honour of a late supreme court justice, Chukwunweike Idigbe, in Abuja.

According to him, the judiciary plays a very important role in nation-building and should be allowed to do their work.

“We need to allow the apex court to come up with their decisions and for the public to be humble enough to accept their decision as final in order to maintain the sanctity of the judiciary as individuals and institutions.

“The litigation tribunals that are now going, let us give the judiciary the opportunity to do their work and let us accept their decisions as it is,” Gowon said.

The Presidential Election Petitions Court will begin hearing of the petitions challenging the announcement of Bola Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress as Nigeria’s president-elect next week Monday.

Tinubu was declared winner of the February 25 poll by the Chairman of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Mahmood Yakubu, on March 1.

He defeated Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP and Peter Obi of the Labour Party, LP, who both filed separate petitions seeking orders to annul the election or declare them as winners of the polls.