Osun election tribunal okays substituted service on Oyetola, INEC

The Osun State Governorship Election Petitions Tribunal has given the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its candidate in the Osun State governorship election, Senator Ademola Adeleke, the go ahead to serve their petition and other court processes on the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) and the candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC) Gboyega Oyetola through substituted means.

The order was given on Monday by the reconsituted panel headed by Justice Muhammad Sirajo in Osogbo, the Osun State capital following an ex parte application brought before the panel by the counsel for Adeleke and PDP, Nathaniel Oke, SAN.

Oke prayed the panel to grant the petitioners the leave to serve the Independent National Electoral Commission; the candidate of the All Progressives Congress, Alhaji Gboyega Oyetola, and his party, the APC, through substituted means since they were allegedly evading service.

Oke prayed the panel for “an order of this honourable tribunal granting leave to the petitioner/applicants to serve the petition, court orders, hearing notices and all other processes already filed and to be filed in this case on the second and third respondents through substituted means by pasting the said petition, court orders and hearing notices and all other processes already filed and to be filed in this case on the notice board of this honourable tribunal.”

He also asked the panel to give an order for the petitioners forensic experts and statisticians to scan and obtain certified true copies of election materials.

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In a ruling read by Justice Peter Obiora, another member of the panel, the tribunal granted the prayers.

It ordered that the petitioners shall pay the requisite statutory fees and that the inspection and examination of the documents shall not be done by the petitioners in the absence of the respondents.

The tribunal also ordered that the respondents shall each send two persons to be present and observe the inspection and examination of the documents.

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