Chrys
The presidential election petition tribunal, on Wednesday,
admitted sensitive documents tendered by the Labour Party (LP) and its
presidential candidate, Peter Obi.
Here are highlights of the proceedings.
LP TENDERS PVCs FROM
32 STATES
The LP and Obi tendered several bundles of documents in
support of their petition.
Led by Peter Afuba, one of the lawyers in the legal team,
the petitioners tendered documents showing the total number of permanent voter
cards (PVCs) collected in 32 states before the 2023 general election.
They also presented documents containing the total number of
registered voters in the states.
A certified true copy of the certificate of compliance in
respect of Edo was also tendered.
Other documents brought before the court include certified
copies of supplementary IReV reports for three LGAs in Benue state, two LGAs in
Cross River, 12 LGAs in Lagos and one LGA in Gombe.
All the respondents in the suit, including the Independent
National Electoral Commission (INEC), President Bola Tinubu, Vice-President
Kashim Shettima and the All Progressives Congress (APC), objected to the
admissibility of the documents tendered.
The respondents said they would state their reasons in their
final written addresses. In the interim, the court admitted the documents as
evidence.
LP CALLS THREE
WITNESSES
Meanwhile, the petitioners called three witnesses at the
court session.
The three witnesses – Chibuike Ugwuoke, Oloko Onoja and
Kefas Iyak – were subpoenaed.
Ugwuoke, who identified as a cyber security expert, tendered
a “metadata” report.
Onoja, the ninth witness, served as an election observer,
while the 10th witness, Iyak, served as a presiding officer.
During cross-examination, Onoja and Iyak admitted that aside
from the issue of uploading results to the IReV portal, the electoral process
was satisfactory.
APM CLOSES CASE
The Allied Peoples Movement (APM) closed its case after
calling one witness to support the petition against President Bola Tinubu‘s
election.
The witness, Aisha Abubakar, who is APM’s assistant welfare
officer, adopted her witness statement on oath while being led in evidence by
Gideon Idiagbonya, the petitioner’s counsel.
Under cross-examination by Kemi Pinheiro, INEC lawyer, the
witness admitted that she could not confirm when the electoral commission
received the notice of substitution of the candidate for Borno central.
The APM is contending that Tinubu was improperly sponsored
by the APC given his nomination of Kashim Shettima as his vice-presidential
candidate for the election.
The party alleged that at the time Shettima accepted to be
APC’s vice-presidential candidate, he was still the party’s candidate for Borno
central senatorial district.
Despite being referred to the supreme court judgment of May
26 which dismissed a similar suit for lacking merit, the party insisted on
pursuing its petition.
The tribunal fixed July 14 for continuation of the matter.
PDP’S PETITION
STALLED
The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) could not proceed with
hearing of its petition on Wednesday.
Although the matter was called, Haruna Tsammani, chairman of
the panel, advised against going ahead with proceedings owing to lack of time
and the late service of documents on the respondents by the petitioners.
The court asked them to return on Thursday for the
continuation of hearing in the petition — while an extension was given till
Friday for the petitioners to present their case.
