The 2023 Presidential Elections may have come and gone, but the legal fireworks fanned by Atiku Abubakar and Peter Obi continue to fiercely burn.
Suffice it to say that it has been a topsy-turvy three weeks at the Presidential Election Petition Court (PEPC) as the aggrieved parties battled to drive home their case challenging the declaration of Ahmed Bola Tinubu as the winner of the said election.
On May 8th, the presidential election petition kicked off with five petitions from different political parties which were later consolidated.
In the buildup of the full-blown hearing of the petitions, there was mild drama as two aggrieved parties Action Alliance (AA) and the Action Peoples Party (APP) withdrew their petitions, during the pre-hearing sessions of the petitions.
However, Peter Obi of the Labour Party (LP), Alhaji Atiku Abubakar and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and Alliance Peoples Movement (APM) continued with the quest to upturn the outcome of the presidential election.
The petitioners were given three weeks to prove their case, after the pre-election reports were delivered on 23rd May 2023, as time allocated for hearing, calling of witnesses and cross-examinations were stated for easy conduct of proceedings.
On July 23rd, Mr Obi and LP closed their case after calling 13 witnesses as against the 50 witnesses registered in their pre-hearing schedule, amongst which they tendered documents, and the total number of registered voters and Permanent Voter Cards (PVCs) collected in 32 states in the lead up to the presidential polls to aid their case.
All their witnesses who were party agents and INEC officials, submitted that accreditation of voters was seamless, but transmission of Presidential election results was difficult, adding that they were made to sign the forms EC8As under duress.
According to the witnesses, all the Labour Party agents totalled 133,000 as against the 176,974 polling units across the country, and they insisted that Peter Obi should be declared winner because he had the most results which were not uploaded as promised by INEC.
Peter Obi and the Labour Party also tendered a report through a subpoenaed witness, Claretta Ogar, who is a cloud engineer and architect and an employee of Amazon Web Services Incorporated, USA.
According to the Star witness, the Amazon Web server that provided cloud services for INEC’s digital backbone for the presidential election did not experience any glitch that could have affected the e-transmission of results on February 25, 2023.
The report specifically provides details on the health status of the Amazon Web server that provided cloud services for INEC’s digital backbone for the presidential election.
The document, totaling six copies were admitted by the court amid objections by the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Bola Ahmed Tinubu, Kashim Shettima and the All Progressive Congress (APC).
Also, two subpoenaed witnesses of the Labour Party and Peter Obi, contradicted each other on the powers and responsibilities of the National Information Technology Development Agency, NITDA, as related to the February 25, 2023 general elections.
Chebuike Ngwoke, a digital cyber-security expert, commissioned to do a cyber-security and risk analysis of the election by the Labour Party, told the court that the International System for Standardization, ISO Certification, is expected to be issued by the National Information Technology Development Agency, NITDA and to the Independent National Electoral Commission in line with the 2007 Act that established it.
However, another subpoenaed witness of Obi, Emmanuel Edet, a legal officer from NITDA contradicted the position that there was no provision in the NITDA Act that gave the agency that role when he was crossed examined by Wole Olanipekun, SAN, Counsel to Tinubu.
On the part of Atiku Abubakar and the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), they had on the 21st of March filed their petitions challenging the emergence of President Bola Tinubu in the February 25 elections.
Closing their case on Friday 23rd June, called a total of 27 witnesses as against 100 submitted in the pre-hearing schedule to prove their case, amongst other documents tendered.
However, speaking to reporters, lead counsel to the Petitioners, Chief Chris Uche SAN, said that the documents tendered took the place of the remaining 73 witnesses.
Some of the notable witnesses called were three Presiding Officers of the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) who told the Presidential Election Petition Court (PEPC) that the refusal of the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) to transmit the presidential election results on Election Day frustrated their jobs.
The Officers, who were testifying on subpoena, admitted that the results of the Senate and the House of Representatives were transmitted unhindered and that the problems of technical glitches arose at the point of transmitting only the presidential poll results.
The three witnesses are Janet Nuhu Turaki, Christopher Bulus Ardo and Victoria Sani who served as INEC’S Presiding Officers at Yobe, Bauchi and Katsina States, respectfully.
Also among the testifiers was Hitler Uwala, who is a forensic Analyst and he tendered 7 volumes of reports based on the 110 BVAS machines inspected.
Under the evidence in chief, Uwala told the court that the results contained in the 110 BVAS machines he inspected were deleted.
However, while under cross-examination by the INEC counsel, he admitted that he was not in Abuja when the elections were conducted and that nothing was wrong with the BVAS machine when he inspected them.
He added that he didn’t interview any of the election presiding officers and does not know if anything was wrong with the BVAs machine on Election Day.
INEC further told the court that the 110 BVAS machines inspected in the Federal Capital Territory constitute only 3.5% out of the 3163 devices allocated to Abuja and less than 0.06% of the total number of BVAS deployed across Nigeria.
To verify the witness’ claims on deleting of results, INEC’s lawyer brought four BVAS devices for the witness to inspect but he refused saying it was professionally wrong to do that as the figures might have been tampered with.
Uwala added that he can’t identify the BVAs machine given to him as one of those he inspected.
Closing their case, the Prosecution witness 27, Mike Enahoro- Ebah who is a Private Legal Practitioner informed the Presidential Election Petitions Court about a USA judgement for criminal forfeiture of assets by President Bola Tinubu and the cover note authorizing it.
The witness also tendered academic records from Chicago University, a copy of the subpoena served on the Chicago University, the original academic records and degree certificate, an original admission letter, an original transcript from Southwest College to the school Tinubu attended, given to Chicago University with the gender referred to as Female and the extract of a Guinea passport and the certificate of compliance for Tinubu.
Counsel for the petitioner, Chris Uche, SAN, admitted certified copies of Academic and work records of President Bola Tinubu tendered by the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and its candidate, Atiku Abubakar.
The documents include a BSc certificate from the Chicago State University, NYSC Discharge Certificate, and Mobil Nigeria Oil Plc certificate of service.
He noted that the documents were purportedly obtained by Tinubu but bore the name ‘Bola Adekunle Tinubu’.
The witness also tendered forms EC13 and EC9 nomination forms and the letters written to the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) as attachments.
Counsel to INEC, Abubakar Mahmoud, Tinubu, Emmanuel Ukala and the APC, Lateef Fagbemi, all objected to the admissibility of the documents.
Meanwhile, the Allied Peoples Movement, APM, which is seeking to nullify the election of President Bola Tinubu, closed its case after calling its sole witness.
The witness, Aisha Abubakar, who identified herself as the Assistant Welfare Director of the party, tendered seven batches of documentary evidence before the court to establish their case.
APC’s lead counsel, Lateef Fagbemi, tendered a copy of the Supreme Court judgement which the Respondents said had earlier settled the issue the APM raised in the petition.
The court admitted it as evidence despite Objections from the APM.
The court subsequently adjourned the matter till July 14 for all the parties to adopt their final briefs of argument and APM closed its case.
The Justice Haruna Tsammani-led five-man panel adjourned till Monday 3rd July for the INEC to open their defence. Expect more fireworks then!
