Tribunal: Melaye accuses Tinubu of backing Adeyemi at A’Court

The Senator representing Kogi West Senatorial District, Dino Melaye, on Sunday alleged that a chieftain of the All Progressives Congress, Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu, had decided to offer support for Senator Smart Adeyemi, who is currently challenging his electoral victory at the Court of Appeal.

Melaye, an APC senator, told journalists in Abuja that Tinubu had contacted the immediate-past Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Mr. Mohammed Bello Adoke (SAN), to take over the legal battle on behalf of Adeyemi.

He also said that Adeyemi, on the request of Tinubu, had forwarded details of the suit to Adoke, asking him to look for a judge in the Court of Appeal that would offer assistance.

But Tinubu, in his reaction, had asked Melaye to look elsewhere for people to blackmail.

Tinubu, who spoke through his Media Adviser, Mr. Sunday Dare, said it was nothing but a “kitchen of malicious lies.”

Dare said, “This is another lie from their kitchen of malicious lies. They are all over the social and traditional media, spewing lies and planting stories. We are not about that. Nigerians are not as gullible as they think.

“He is aligned with people who want to kill the party, and we wish him luck, but they will not succeed because the party belongs to the Nigerian people.

“This blackmail, like other ones, will not work. It cannot stick. Adoke? Who is he? Tinubu cannot recall when last he saw him or even spoke with him. Dino should look elsewhere for people to blackmail.”

Melaye had claimed that he incurred the wrath of Tinubu after refusing to back down from supporting the Senate President, Bukola Saraki, during the recently concluded election of presiding officers of the 8th Senate.

But Melaye said he had no regret over his role, leading to the emergence of Saraki as the Senate President.

He said, “I have no regret supporting Senator Saraki and my electoral victory was ordained by God and not by man. Therefore, no mortal can reverse it. In God I trust, no matter how desperate they might be.

“I am privy to an electronic mail sent to Adoke by an Abuja-based senior editor who is close to Tinubu in which he forwarded the court papers filed by Smart Adeyemi at the tribunal to Adoke.

“In the said e-mail, Adoke was told to look for a trusted justice in the Court of Appeal who would be useful for Smart Adeyemi.”

It will be recalled that the Election Petition Tribunal in Lokoja had upheld the election of Melaye who was elected on the platform of the APC.

The tribunal had dismissed the petition filed by a former chairman of the Nigeria Union of Journalists and former chairman, Senate Committee on FCT, Adeyemi, because his lawyers filed their defence too late.

Delivering judgment in the suit, Chairman of the three-member tribunal, Justice Akon Ikpeme, described the petition by Adeyemi, the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, as “incurably defective.”

Copyright PUNCH.