Wike sues Atiku over 2023 presidential ticket

In what appears to be a looming controversy, Rivers Governor Nyesom Wike has sued the presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Atiku Abubakar over the party’s presidential ticket.

The Nation reports there has been no-love lost between Atiku and Wike over the choice of the former’s running mate and other issues.

Wike came second during the primary, scoring 237 votes to trail Atiku, who polled 371 votes from the total 767 votes cast at the convention ground in Abuja.

Attached in the suit is the Sokoto Governor, Aminu Tambuwal and the PDP. He sued the party over the conduct of the presidential primary of the party that was held in Abuja on May 28 and May 29, 2022.

Wike and a PDP chieftain, Michael Newgent Ekamon, are listed as the plaintiffs in the suit marked FHC/ABJ/CS/782/2022.Wike and his co-applicant asked the court to determine eight issues surrounding the party’s presidential convention.

They are: “determine whether the purported transfer of Tambuwal’s votes to Atiku by the PDP was illegal and void.“The court should also determine if Tambuwal lost his claim to votes the moment he stepped down for Atiku.

He asked the court to determine whether Tambuwal “having stepped down during the primaries ought to lose his votes.”

They prayed the court to “cancel the transfer of votes and a corresponding order restraining the 3rd respondent (Tambuwal’s) withdrawal in the primary was done after voting had commenced.”

The applicants also prayed the court to declare that the PDP and Atiku took undue advantage of Tambuwal’s withdrawal when they allowed the Sokoto governor to persuade delegates to vote for the former Vice-President in the primary.

Wike and Ekamon asked the court to order INEC to reject or remove Atiku from “its list of candidates in the 2023 presidential election.”