By Kunle Olasanmi -Abuja
Governor Nyesom Wike of Rivers state has asked the Rivers State Election Petition Tribunal to set aside the order it made for the inspection of election materials used for the April 11, 2015 governorship election in the state.
Counsel to Governor Wike, Emmanuel Ukala, in the motion dated June 16th, 2015 asked the court to set aside the order granted on June 11, 2015 to inspect the materials used for the election.
According to the motion, the order made after an exparte motion was moved by counsel to the petitioner, Olumide Olujinmi, was unknown to law.
Ukala further argued that the order was made despite a motion challenging the jurisdiction of the court pending before the court.
During yesterday's proceedings, Chairman of the tribunal, Justice Muazu Abdulkadir Pindiga, fixed July 6, 2015 for the hearing of the motion.
The motion could not be heard yesterday because other parties in the petition filed by the All Progresive Congress (APC) in Rivers State and its gubernatorial candidate in the election needed time to react to it.
The APC and its candidate had through their counsel sought the leave of the court to order the inspection of electoral materials used for the governorship election in Rivers State.
In the motion exparte dated June 3 and filed on June 8, counsel to APC and Dakuku Peterside, the candidate of the APC in the election, Mr. Olumide Olujinmi, prayed the court for an order allowing the inspection of the electoral materials related to the conduct of the gubernatorial election in the state.
He begged the court to order the inspections of Card Readers and records of electoral materials used in all the polling units in the state.
In a short ruling, the tribunal granted the requests of the appplicants.
It however, asked the applicants to put the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and the state governor, Barrister Nyesom Wike on notice on the other request to conduct a forensic analysis on the computers, and computer servers used for the election.
The APC in Rivers State and its candidate in the election dragged INEC, PDP and Governor Wike before the tribunal to challenge his victory at the April 11 election in the state.
INEC declared Wike as the winner of the election.
Last month, the tribunal ordered that the state governor should be served with the court summon through substituted means.
Counsel to the APC had told the tribunal that he was unable to serve the governor.
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