The Labour Party and its presidential candidate for the February 25th election on Friday closed their case before the presidential election petition tribunal.
13 out of the 50 proposed witnesses were called within the 3 weeks Obi was allotted to present his case against INEC’s declaration of Bola Tinubu as the winner of the February 25th presidential election.
The witnesses include those summoned by the court.
Within the three weeks, Obi and his party the LP in their joint petition also tendered a profusion of evidence including form EC8A from 18 states, polling units results, ward results, local governments results, states and the final results upon which INEC’s Chairman Professor Yakubu Mahmood based his declaration of Tinubu as winner of the poll as well as electronic documents to prove their case.
Many of the results tendered were blurred and were Certified True Copies released by INEC to the petitioners.
Although the respondents – Tinubu, Shettima, APC and INEC objected to the admissibility of the documents, the court admitted the documents saying that ruling in the objections would be made during the delivery of the final judgement in the petition.
Also played at the court were the videos clips of interviews and press conference showing Mahmood and an INEC Commissioner for Voter Education, Mr. Festus Okoye, assuring on electronic transmission of the 2023 general elections.
Despite the assurances, INEC failed to transmit results of the presidential election real time from the polling units to the INEC’s Results Viewing (IReV) portals as promised and in accordance with the regulations and guidelines for the 2023.
In Friday’s hearing, Dr. Livy Uzoukwu, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) led the Obi’s counsel team while Ikechukwu Ezechukwu, SAN, led the proceedings.
LP and Obi witness, Yunusa Tanko was cross examined by the repondents lawyers, in yesterday’s proceedings. Tanko was Obi’s Presidential Campaign Spokesperson.
He maintained that the election process was marred with irregularities and substantial non-compliance with the electoral laws.
He noted that “If the results were uploaded as required by the law, my party would have gotten more votes than what was allocated to us.”
PDP, ATIKU CLOSE CASE
The PDP and Atiku also closed their case on Friday after calling 27 witnesses out of the proposed 100 witnesses and tendering several documents in evidence.
Their last witness tendered several documents — including a BSc certificate from Chicago State University, a National Youth Service Corps (NYSC) discharge certificate and Mobil Nigeria Oil Plc certificate of service — which bore the name “Bola Adekunle Tinubu”.
Also tendered were Tinubu’s forms EC13 and EC9 submitted to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) to enable him to contest the election.
The court adjourned further hearing until 3 July for the respondents – Mr Tinubu, INEC and APC- to open their defence.
Ifunanya Ikueze is an Engineer, Safety Professional, Writer, Investor, Entrepreneur and Educator.
