BY TIMOTHY AGBOR, OSOGBO
A Federal High Court sitting in Osogbo, Osun State, will on May 11 commence hearing in the suit brought against the emergence of Senator Ademola Adeleke as the candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party for the July 16 governorship election in the state by his rival, Dotun Babayemi.
Babayemi, a factional candidate of the party, through his counsel, Yusuff Alli, had applied that the court should abridge time so as to accelerate the hearing of the case but the counsel to PDP, I.T Tewogbola opposed the application.
Babayemi is asking court to compel the Independent National Electoral Commission and the party to recognise him as the sole gubernatorial candidate instead of Adeleke.
Babayemi, in a suit marked FHC/OS/CyS/26/2022 and presided over by Justice N. Ayo-Emmanuel, is challenging that the respondents did not use the authentic party delegate list as ordered by the state High Court sitting in Ijebu-Jesa, presided over by Justice Adeyinka Aderibigbe.
Ruling on the application for the abridgement of time on Monday, Justice Ayo-Emmanuel granted Babayemi’s prayer and overruled PDP’s opposition.
The court granted the application for the abridgement of time of 15 days for the respondents to file their respective responses while the applicant was given 2 days to file his further-affidavit.
Consequently, Ayo-Emmanuel adjourned the case till May 11, 2022, for the hearing of the substantive matter.
Recall that an Osun State High Court sitting in Ijebu-Jesa, had pronounced that the party primary that produced Babayemi was the authentic.
Notwithstanding, the national leadership of the party and INEC recognised the primary that produced Adeleke and have been parading him as the governorship candidate of the PDP in Osun.
