Nigeria President Muhammadu Buhari, the All Progressives Congress and the Independent National Electoral Commission were absent and not represented by their lawyers as the Election Tribunal granted Atiku Abubakar and Peoples Democratic Party the access to electoral materials.

Both Buhari, APC and INEC are the respondents in the suit.

But the three-man panel led by Justice Abdul Aboki unanimously rejected other prayers by the applicants seeking orders permitting them to, among others, photocopy and scan the electoral documents.

The tribunal also refused their requests to be allowed to conduct a forensic examination and forensic analysis of the materials and have access to card reader data and information contained in the cloud and electronic storage used for the poll.

Delivering the lead ruling, Justice Aboki said by virtue of the provision of section 151 of the Electoral Act on which the applicants’ motion ex parte was anchored, they were only entitled to inspection of the electoral materials and the certified true copies of all the materials used for the poll.

The two other members of the panel, Justices Peter Ige and Emmanuel Agim, agreed with the lead ruling.

The applicants’ legal team was led by Mr. Livy Ozoukwu (SAN), but Chief Chris Uche (SAN), made submissions on behalf of the team.