Former federal lawmaker, Ben Murray Bruce has said that Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, and his Labour Party, LP, counterpart, Peter Obi, should not have gone to court to challenge the victory of the All Progressives Congress, APC, candidate, Bola Ahmed Tinubu in the first place.
The Bayelsa-born former lawmaker was reacting to the victory of Tinubu at the Presidential Election Petition Tribunal on Wednesday.
Atiku and Peter Obi are challenging the declaration of Bola Ahmed Tinubu as the winner of the 2023 presidential election by the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC.
They suffered a major setback on Wednesday in the legal battle to unseat Tinubu as Nigeria’s elected President.
Both men are now heading to the Supreme Court where the matter would be laid to rest, but Ben Murray-Bruce felt they should not have started the journey at all.
According to him, the politicians should have saved themselves the trouble by emulating former President Goodluck Jonathan, who in 2015, picked up his phone and congratulated Muhammadu Buhari even before the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, announced the final results.
According to Bruce, there should be no need to further waste time and resources once the electoral umpire has declared the winner of an election.
“We must follow the Jonathan doctrine and accept the people’s verdict in the interest of democracy and the nation,” he wrote on X.
“Our elections don’t have to end in the courts,” he insisted.
The PDP chieftain further advised that the aggrieved politicians should accept the Tribunal verdict and place national interest above self-interest.
“Bola Ahmed Tinubu, @officialABAT, is the duly elected and undisputed President of Nigeria, @NGRPresident,” he said, adding that there should be no further doubts and dispute after the judgement.
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