The Chairman of the Election Petitions Tribunal sitting over the September 21 Edo State governorship poll Justice Wilfred Kpochi yesterday sought the cooperation of the parties, their supporters, lawyers, law enforcement agencies and the media.

Justice Kpochi made the call at the inaugural sitting and pre-hearing of the petitions received over the election in Benin.

The candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Asue Ighodalo and five others are challenging the declaration of Governor Monday Okpebholo of the All Progressives Congress (APC) as the winner of the election.

Others in the suit are the Accord Party (AC), Allied Peoples Movement (APM), Action Democratic Party (ADP), Zenith Labour Party (ZLP) and Social Democratic Party (SDP) The chairman also urged the lawyers not to engage in unnecessary arguments that could lead to shouting.

He said: “I am impressed by the conducive and calm environment I am seeing and going forward, I will want this to continue, I appeal to you all that let us put our eyes on the ball so that we can have serene proceedings.

“You have SANs and very senior lawyers here, nobody is going to shout at you, please don’t also shout at us, if there are areas you feel not comfortable about, please draw our attention to it.”

Ken Mozia (SAN), lead counsel to Ighodalo, pledged their commitment to the proceedings as far as according to other parties would do the same.

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